I Need A Teacher
by TheOneAndOnlySlayer
Summary: Rey swallows. "Luke is gone. There's no one left. And," she hesitates, clears her throat. "And I need a teacher." Kylo Ren, now Ben Solo, finally gets to show Rey the ways of the Force... To kill Snoke. Rated M for some swears (for now), but it's gonna be a nice, slow Reylo burn
1. Chapter 1

I Need A Teacher

By TheOneAndOnlySlayer

Chapter 1

Note: this chapter has been edited 9-15-2016

A precious few of the Resistance are in hiding, on the coast of some planet Rey doesn't even know the name of. They've taken refuge in an ancient stone castle with no built-in tech at all. Here, Kylo Ren has relinquished his title and allegiance to the Dark Side, defeated by Rey and willingly humiliated. Interrogated for hours, Kylo – Ben Solo – iss kept in the strongest cell, where a sheer thousand-foot drop appears out of the only window.

It's damp and cold and there's hardly any food around, except fish. Salt and brine reek everywhere. The prisoner has been fasting, an attempt to calm his sense of defeat.

Rey barely survived her last and only encounter so far with Snoke. He put her in some comatose state with just a touch of his fingertip, where all the horrors of her life, her childhood, and her deepest fears swarmed around her and through her like a thousand cuts. When she woke up screaming, pleading for death, this man – Snoke's valuable student, her enemy – loomed above her, eyes wide with concern.

It was all just very weird. He was acting very weird, especially when he turned to an aghast Finn and quietly said something like, "You can return me to my cell now."

For days Rey was stuck in an improvised med bay. Snoke had even reduced her muscles to goo. Breathing had been difficult because her lungs had collapsed. She had been as helpless as a newborn.

The only two with medical training were unclear on how they brought Rey back to full health. They could only offer guesses on what the Force could have done for her. Rey, though, sensed that Kylo had something to do with it. No one meditates that often in a cell for no reason.

When she got out, Finn told her that Leia had been with Ren. _Ben Solo_ , they were supposed to call him now. Or the prisoner, which worked out better for everyone else. They had been left alone, but not completely. Leia had worn a pulse scanner while she had a two-day-long heart-to-heart with her messed-up son.

Leia had not wasted any time asking about Rey's recovery. "The First Order is ready to crumble, but it can stay that way forever with Snoke's head on a pile of Bantha shit on a platter. Ben is the last key we've got to make that happen, but he needs you. You have to talk to him."

Which is how Rey ended up back in the same room with him.

Some time ago, Kylo's face felt like a weakness, an advantage in Rey's favor. It is always full of emotions, no matter how hard he has tried to tamper them down. Rey could sense his anger, fury, frustration, loss and overconfidence before he could. It had been easier to taunt him into a duel without a mask, just so that reservoir of emotion could be poked and prodded at her will.

Now she feels like an intruder. She feels uncomfortable looking him in the face. He is bound in vibro-chains which hang grimly around him, against the wall. His black hair is wild but he's somber.

It's like staring into a tomb. Rey had absolutely no idea what to say to him on her way up here. Now she's utterly blank, except …

"You said that I need a teacher."

Ben – Kylo Ren - raises his head from where he had been staring at the floor. He looks so exhausted and drained that Rey has to swat away the pity for him. Just – no. it's distracting now.

The son of her leader gives no indication he remembers this. He should. He said it so clearly into the wintry air that night so long ago.

"That night in the forest, where we fought the first time. You said – "

"I know what I said." His voice is without emotion.

Rey swallows. "Luke is gone. There's no one left. And," she hesitates, clears her throat. "And I need a teacher."

He glares at her with a sudden strength coiling around him. "You. Are. Batshit _insane_."

"No, I'm not!" she protests. "It makes perfect sense. Snoke taught you for years. He confided things to you. You know his methods, maybe even his weaknesses."

Ben is talking over her stubborn optimism as loudly as she is. "No. No, he would sense it a _million_ light-years away. It's impossible, he's too strong, he is _surrounded_ by the other knights right now – "

"Gods-dammit Ben, stop trying to hide from this and own it!" Rey shouts at him with uncontrolled fury. She actually kicks the rusty metal door, making the guards behind them jump.

Ben is completely unperturbed. The most he does is raise an eyebrow and scowl.

"You want to come back to us. You said you needed to repent. That you need to undo it. This," she points feverishly at the floor between them, as if the plan to destroy Snoke has manifested there. "This is the most important thing you will ever do in your life. Anakin Skywalker could only kill the master who enslaved him within moments of his death. And only because his son was being tortured to death in front of him."

"Don't mock my interest in my grandfather."

 _You mean obsession._ Rey straightens. An absurd image of Leia or Han feeding him as an infant and acting this obstinate threatens to ruin her effort at getting through to him.

"Don't know why I'm bothering. I soundly kicked your arse the first time. Literally every time after. I'll probably do him in the same way."

He laughs. It's almost scary. She's never seen him laugh before, but damn, he must not have laughed (even if he may be in the brink of insanity) in a long, long time.

"I would be the worst teacher in the galaxy," he declares, though to Rey it's more like a pathetic attempt at self-pity. "Worse than Uncle Luke."

It sounds too childlike for a man his age to say "Uncle Luke." Rey's losing him. She tries for some humor. "Can't be any worse than the Blobfish who taught me how to be a scavenger. He was a right dick."

Then Ben shoots her a look. He isn't laughing. His long mouth is closed and his eyes are the most expressive, glittering and tired like dying stars. But in that look she can tell he's at least mildly amused.

All too quickly, she sobers. She tries for the first time to speak his real name. As if it really does have any power.

"Ben." She is quiet and patient. She has to get through to him. "We need you."

At this, Ben perks a little bit.

"You mother…needs you," she adds. Then, in a weaker voice, she admits, "I need you. Please."

Ben's hope is suspended by her. She can't believe she has offered this much, admitted so much. She wonders if Luke would have been upset that she is handing such a gentle piece of her soul to the man who has killed dozens at his own hand and almost killed her. Would he crush it, abandon it under too much pressure?

The weight of Luke's lightsaber weighs heavily in her pack. She knows what to do with it now.

She takes it out and crosses over to him. She takes one of his hands. They're so cold, she has to fight off the urge to rub them between her own. Where is this coming from?

When she places the hilt into his palm, he almost recoils. Absentmindedly, Rey studies his hand. It's a little paler than her own, with rough skin and faint traces of dark hair around the knuckles. His fingers are longer than hers. She wraps them around the hilt and tilts her head up.

He studies the lightsaber he has tried so zealously to acquire. "You're crazy."

Apparently this is his way of communication now. He's not going to simply play nice and say pleasant-sounding things like "Gee, thanks Rey, you're a real sport."

"I'm a little crazy, yeah," she assents with a faint laugh. "Look, I know this is all really fucked up and…we're both a little fucked up right now. But this is the only thing that's left. Snoke…he has to pay for what he's done."

She's so close to him that she can see the way his hair changes its shade in the light. There are a few freckles on his face. His nose is a little bigger than usual, too.

Rey refuses to look at his mouth, even though she eagerly waits for him to say something.

Something tells Rey that she ought to back off. It's a lot to process right now. Too much… overstimulation, she reasons, may cause Ben to retreat into his mind. He would be of no use then, and as much as Rey and Leia are determined to see him return to the light, the Resistance would be more than happy to execute him.

"I'll come back in the morning," she says tiredly. She was so close. Han Solo's body pierced by an angry red blade still echoes in her mind, but she could feel Ben drawing into the light a little more. She doesn't have a clue what she's doing, and for some reason meditation feels like a good idea tonight.

She retreats. Behind her Ben swallows, relents. "I can't teach you in here."

Rey pauses at the door. "Obviously."

Ben Solo, formerly Kylo of the Knights of Ren, stands in chains that are fused against the wall. In a strange contrast, he grips his uncle's lightsaber. It's this quiet, strong, dignified stance that Rey had seen in her dream a year ago, not believing that Kylo could be reclaimed into the side of good again.

She allows herself to believe it now.

His gaze is strong, and he doesn't look as anxious as he did before. He exhales. "Tomorrow."


	2. Chapter 2

I Need A Teacher

Chapter 2

Updated 9-15-2016

The search for dinner is a mostly silent affair. Leia has been moody, probably because she has her son locked away upstairs. Ben Solo may be cooperating with the Resistance, but for his safety he's officially just a First Order informant. Days ago, when Rey was still too weak to sit up, Finn told her he gathered things did not go so well as Leia talked to him. The woman could be heard shouting more than the "former" Ren Knight known for his violent fury.

There are about a dozen of them altogether in the lower chamber of this stone watchtower. If they had more access to food and power heaters (their energy would attract sensors from anyone looking for them) Rey would agree their hideout was beautiful in a gloomy way. The sky is often overcast and blanketed in rolling clouds of pearl and slate grey. The water is almost the same color with a glint of blue silver. The peninsula they landed on includes a charcoal-colored beach and a sheer cliff where the castle is built on. Beechpecker birds circle overhead and perch in obscure corners of the abandoned shelter. Moss and lichen are abundant here, as are mollusk-like creatures.

Rey helps Leia look around for some fish. Besides what Rey's learned from Luke Skywalker during her training, Leia's foraging skills from her Rebel Alliance days are still sharp, despite her prickly demeanor today. She and Rey respect the fact that they need to concentrate on something else, like what the hell they're supposed to eat. Rations aren't exactly in abundance among their not-so-merry band.

Rey feels through the Force for active movement under the lapping waves. A smattering of large rocks line the beach, where Finn and a Mangorian pilot named Kivi hop over and peer for crustaceans.

There's a path of quick rippling under the surface. Rey catches it and hones the Force, lifting a marbled fish out of the water. It arcs into the air and into her awaiting –

Whoosh! A flash of white and yellow feathers dive in and snatches Rey's fish. She snaps out of the way and falls on her bottom.

"Oy!" she bellows angrily. She's _really_ hungry. She can feel her muscles burning already.

Finn and Kivi are poised, half-intending to run a hundred feet over to the bird and kill them both. Leia casts a pleading look skyward, her hopelessness blatant.

"Damn it, kriff, blummin hells!" Rey shouts.

"Great," she can hear Finn say dejectedly at her madness. He actually sits down like a parent waiting for his child to cease a tantrum.

Leia shakes her head. "Well, kids, I guess its… leaf and mollusk soup for tonight."

Rey wants to shake her fist at the sky and laugh at their misfortune. What a bunch of heroes they look like…

The four all mistake the sound of rustling as the waves breaking off into the distance. After a few seconds it sounds too intense, and though the sky quickly turns to a dark navy, they can see hundreds of tiny pricks of whitewater, like a bunch of things breaking from the surface.

They begin to shield their heads, Kivi calling out "What the kriff – !" Silvery darts soar out of the water like the way Rey almost caught that first fish.

But none of this is her. Already, she's exhausted from using too much power from the Force. She's still weak.

"Rey - ?"

"It's not me," she says to Leia as about a dozen fish plunk onto the beach. They flop wildly. No one moves to collect the fish. They all slowly turn their heads to where Ben Solo's cell in the castle resides.

Finally Finn breaks the silence. "Thank you!"

ssssssssssssss

Finn offers to take up a cooked fillet to Ben. Rey and Kivi use the flattest rock big enough for a length of one fish to cook in the middle of the fire. It's charred but still tastes salty from the sea. They've checked from a short-range databank if it's poisonous for humanoids.

"I'll make sure he passes on compliments to the chef," Finn jokes flatly. Rey's ready to pass out from too much exertion but tries not to show it.

Still, Leia won't be fooled. "You sure you okay?"

Rey can feel the sinew in her arms and thighs echo with newborn weakness. "No," she admits. "I still feel…"

Leia nods. She's not sure how to explain Rey's recovery, either. One minute she saw her son, a black phantom, carry her young Jedi friend into their ship, and the next, Rey's vitals were collapsing.

The older woman revisits the scene from a few days ago.

 _Leia's keeping their shuttle hovering above Snoke's hideout. It's an unmarked model instead of the_ Falcon _. She's losing her concentration – there's something wrong, and she can't focus between Luke, who's been strong and centered as the earth, and Rey, who's all over the place._

 _It hurts to even keep her eyes open. She instantly feels very, very old. Her hands shake on the controls. She's never experienced this much upheaval since she rescued Luke, over thirty years ago, on Cloud City._

 _And then there's her son._

 _Ben's signature has always stayed with her. She's managed to do her duty without drawing his attention – he's certainly done the same concerning their connection through the Force – but now, now it's actually like a beacon. He's actually calling to her._

Mom.

S _he is shaken to the core. She has withstood nightmares of murder and heartbreak just to hope that she will hear that voice again._ Mom, I'm here. I'm coming.

 _And then there's a searing pain, a shock of lightning to her thin veins. She throws her hands to her head and heart. It's clenching so tight._

" _Leia!" Chewie cries in concern._

" _I'm – " Leia can't even say she's fine. She's definitely, definitely not. Her head is on fire._

 _A pair of eyes, bluer than the sky, appropriate as her true family's namesake, burn in agony. Hope is held on like oxygen for the last minute until it's extinguished._

Leia. Leia, I love you. I'm sorry.

Ssssssssssssssssss

In the present Leia clenches her teeth. She will not remember her brother's last words as "I'm sorry." Han said it.

ssssssssssssss

 _When she comes to, Leia sees Finn's inappropriately youthful face. He's got a blaster over his shoulder and he's pushing her hair from her face._

 _If she hadn't passed out, she'd have blushed and teased him for the tender way he held her. "Where's Luke? Where is he?"_

 _The whites of Finn's eyes flash. He whirls around. "I don't…"_

" _We've got to go!" Chewie's yelling._

 _Behind Finn, the docking bay is wide open. The wind's blowing and the unsteadiness of the ship shows that they still clumsily hover over the ground._

 _There's a sudden lurch of movement. It's a powerful surge of the Force that makes Leia's stomach drop. She knows before she can see that Ben, Kylo Ren, her son levitated himself on the ship._

 _Rey's unconscious form is held tightly in his arms. He's even cradling her head in the crook of his shoulder. He looks down on the small Jedi girl like -_

" _Where's Luke?" she says sharply as the docking bay hisses closed._

 _Her son, whose face she hasn't seen since he was a teenager, glances in thinly disguised concern at Finn, who shakes his head helplessly._

" _Where's my_ brother _, Ben?" she screams. "Where is – "_

 _And then it hits her. The emptiness. It's a hollow pain like her organs had been scooped out. She is a cavity swelling in numb, blind torment._

" _Oh, nooo," she moans, unable to hold any of it back. Her husband. Her brother. "Noooo, please, not Luke. LUKE! Please, don't go….!"_

 _She's gasping, clenching her chest and throat. She can't breathe._

" _Ohhh, please, nooooo…!"_

 _She feels arms around her, shyly, then breaking down in pity for her and holding her._

 _It's Finn. She opens her eyes expecting to see Ben hunched against the wall guiltily, too burdened to go over to her. But he's disappeared with Rey._

Ssssssssssssssss

Leia's about fifty percent sure she'll survive this war. Maybe less, on some days…when she doesn't like the idea of living after it's over. She's an old woman. They mostly aren't in the line of fire, especially with her high rank. She doesn't care if she lives or dies. She's been saying it for half of her life, but now she really believes it.

Still. Ben's up there, utterly complacent and soft-spoken. It's the one thing that she's carefully waiting to see will happen.

Rey's silently chewing next to her. She's cute, Leia will admit. Not quite as stunning as Leia's mother – either of her mothers, actually. The former scavenger clings to her boyish style and has probably only brushed her hair to keep sand fleas out.

Ben is in love with her. He needs her. Leia knows it even if these two don't.

She wants to stab something because _why couldn't she have brought Ben back_? Why this kid with no last name? It's not fair. Ben won't even look at her but he'll bring Rey back from the dead.

Leia doesn't have to say any more to Rey. The girl knows exactly what's at stake. Leia only wonders what will happen to the two of them, this next generation of Jedi, after she's gone.


	3. Chapter 3

I Need a Teacher

Chapter 3 complete

By TheOneAndOnlySlayer

Ben Solo is unraveling.

He grips and flexes his hands to forget the smell of blood on them. It's a testament to his care for his appearance that he does not put his hands over his ears, because the screaming won't go away. He can't shake off these sensations.

The old priest on Jakku. The star Resistance pilot (still alive, thank the Force). Countless others he doesn't have the strength to revisit individually. All of them, gone because of his blindness, his worthless loyalty…

The chilly weather makes his face sweat. He's convinced he's tricked himself into a fever. It's as if he's experiencing withdrawal from his attachment to the Dark Side.

And of course, there's still Snoke searching for him, calling him back. Ben's strength is draining because of this attempt to unconsciously divert Snoke's search for him through the Force. It's like learning how to breathe without thinking about it. This is why his surrender to the small Resistance band led by his mother has been so unexpectedly cooperative; he hasn't the energy to maintain a sense of pride.

His pale form shudders. He wants to punch the wall until his knuckles are raw. He can't because self-inflicting any harm would be a loss of control. Giving in to pain to center his anger and confusion is not the way anymore.

He must concentrate. He will not admit he's lost.

But he needs it. He needs just this one distraction.

Ben stills his mind, calms it. He stills it so much so that the other Force-sensitives downstairs won't sense what he's about to do.

There is a set of knives he procured from the last training ground of the Knights of Ren. Ben Solo had been searched for any weapons before being held in this "cell." He can easily escape it. He can either jump off the cliff outside his window (which he could climb out) and swim to the beach. He can also climb along the high edge and along the peninsula. Or he can even use a Jedi Mind Trick against the two Resistance men guarding the entrance.

A child could escape them. Ben's staying put because it's the most obvious form of his promise not to betray them.

That doesn't mean he won't draw up shields to give himself some privacy.

Whenever Rey, his mother, the former Stormtrooper or the others have the inclination to see him, Ben will sense it. He knows that for tonight he has hours' worth of time alone.

He knows that what he is dying to do is not right, but he's desperate. His mind is all over the place, rampant and nervous like a cornered animal. The only thing he knows to clear his head is pain.

It's just a small… _arguably_ unrelated figment of the Dark Side's training.

The set of knives he did not let the guards confiscate are under his gloves. He takes them out, each a varying length and style, and lays them out in front of him. These are used for many purposes: they are first introduced in a Knight of Ren's training as a form of torture. The master uses each knife to inflict pain, preparing them for the (at first) minor injuries in battle. Moreover, the pain inflicted acts as an anchor of a Knight's rage, lust for power, and desire for dominance.

The second purpose in a Knight's training is the act of causing pain on an innocent, a victim outside of war.

Ben is familiar with both exercises.

Luke Skywalker, if he were here, would know about Ben's thought process immediately. He has spent years learning about his father's journey as Darth Vader, and would be attuned with Ben's churning mix of doubt and disorienting guilt. He would have confiscated these tools in an instant and forced Ben into a purging of emotions.

If only his Uncle were here. Ben would forsake everything, his arms and legs, his tongue for Luke's help. He will never be free to ask Luke's forgiveness, not in a thousand years of penance.

He wants to die. He actually considered throwing himself out the window like the tragic old stories, but he had scoffed because it felt too dramatic. Also his self-preserving instincts would kick in halfway down the descent.

He now had his uncle's lightsaber, and wouldn't that have been even more poetic? Driving it into his traitorous heart.

 _Get it together_ , he tells himself. He's not even sure he can call himself _Ben_ yet.

The lightsaber stays in his robes. He just has to make it through the night, and he'll be fine.

Just one thing…

He removes his cape, his tunic and shirt until his chest is exposed. The turgid misty air does not cool him down.

Taking a deep breath, he selects one blade and feels around his torso for a discrete spot. There are many older ones; he decides on the tender stretch of skin on his side. He can't go too deep. If they notice he favors his right arm whenever he extends it, they'll pry.

He grits his teeth and slides the blade through, just an inch. It's an awkward place to have a wound, even a pinprick like this, but it does the trick; he directs all the conflict in his head into that one spot and lets it burn exquisitely. Black clothes become practical in this moment because it hides the mess he's made.

The faces, the cries all go away for a moment. He exhales.

Only a few stick, like stains: His mother (Leia Organa Solo; he doesn't think he can ever call her what he's called her his whole life, ever again) and the young Jedi, his equal, the rival he will never best but has pursued half a dozen times anyway.

Kylo Ren's fighting prowess had hungered for such a challenge. Beyond marching around looking menacing, his career in the First Order had been executioner of anything Jedi-related. After the massacre, his energy dulled.

Then he found her in the woods and was fixated on this living, breathing Jedi vessel. For so long he had been collecting and extinguishing relics that he was almost clueless on what to do with her.

It did not matter in the end because she escaped him and continually, teasingly evaded him.

It was tiresome in some degree. It eventually became tiresome to Snoke, the way Kylo Ren would perk at her presence right before an ambush or in the middle of a skirmish. He always promised to bring her to his master, to sway her to the Dark Side as one of their own, a prized pupil, but every time he had to say he failed to capture her… Snoke must have known Kylo Ren's efficiency was beginning to wane.

She would whisper to him, _try to beat me this time._ And every time, they slipped into a world where it was only the two of them, dark and light. They could never land real killing blows. Rey may have claimed in her mind that she could not kill her leader's only son, but there was a faint hope that she, too…

As he bleeds, the dark-haired man picks up the lightsaber. His own crossguard lightsaber is here, too, but he won't dare touch it.

Rey's request stuns him, even now. Does she have any idea what she's suggested? She almost died. He could have shaken her in her bright, it's-so-simple attitude.

The way she pleaded with him. _I need you_. So manipulative. And she _knew_ the way he offered to teach her in the first duel, so ecstatic in his rage and energy to fight someone with as much vigor as him.

He is disgusted with himself. To think, he had tried to have her brought under Snoke's tutelage?

 _No_ , he corrects himself. His own. Kylo Ren would have been her master. He doubts, now that he reflects on it, that he would have allowed Rey to be exposed to Snoke. He probably would have avoided a meeting to keep Rey all to himself.

Well, there's an idea. She'll be expecting a lesson from him tomorrow. He has to think of something constructive to teach her.

He puts away the blades, patches himself up and meditates.


	4. Chapter 4

I Need A Teacher

By TheOneAndOnlySlayer

Chapter 4 - complete

Finn stubbornly wraps himself in a blanket next to the young Jedi. "Do you have any idea what you're doing tomorrow?"

Rey purses her lips like she's in trouble. "No."

Finn exhales through his nose. "You're not worried…?"

"Course I am."

He pauses. "D'you really believe…?"

Rey adjusts her head so she faces her friend. She only told Finn about her dream (the main part, anyways), but that had taken a long time. Kylo Ren had left Finn crippled. A metal spine is fused to his skin like a morbid experiment. She remembered feeling like she was trading in her friendship, more precious than her lightsaber or Jedi Mind Tricks, for the monster that maimed him.

"I…I'm not sure. I feel the change. I sat in a room with him and he didn't attack me. Not even verbally. I felt nothing from him."

Finn's eyes meet hers. "Do you have any idea how weird it was to see him do his meditate thing over you? To get Snoke's curse out of your head?"

Rey looks away.

"And I didn't even, I don't know, I never thought he was hurting you. Or maybe I thought he was gonna hurt me or something." Finn looks lost.

Rey shivers. She's asked Finn before what he knew of Kylo Ren while he was still fighting for the First Order. Despite his equal hatred for the dark warrior, Finn had been reluctant to discuss it with Rey at all. She carefully phrases her question. "Do you believe that he's really… _not_ Kylo Ren anymore?"

Finn considers this carefully. "He's not Kylo Ren anymore," he muses. "But we have no idea what he is now."

Rey doesn't look encouraged at this at all. It's what everyone in the castle's thinking, anyways.

"Still," Finn offers. "I want to believe."

Meditation hadn't helped. At all.

Rey dreams of her suffering from Snoke. She tried to reason that her nights would be sleepless. They had to be. She can't possibly go back to that nightmare again.

But she does.

She screams. She sees a quick shadow in the sand and a Twi'lek girl she used to talk to in a dark room. She sees a burning planet-sized city with silver towers burning from the inside. She sees blood, lightsaber burns and millions of stars surrendering to the night, dying.

Snoke is violating her a hundred times harder than Kylo Ren's attempt, back when he used to hide behind a mask. Rey doesn't even have the energy to scream, and that evokes more pain and sadness than she can imagine.

She seizes in her sleep, shaking. The planet they're on isn't far enough from the First Order. They'll - he will - come for them. And Rey will be terribly powerless...

 _...Rey. Don't be afraid..._

...as Luke Skywalker, the last Jedi Master, was.

She unconsciously pushes Finn until he wakes. Since his last deadly encounter with Kylo Ren, Finn has had a remarkable ability to evade any injuries. He's been the first to help others, to offer comfort in any way and to even make a fool of himself. Bless him, he's the face of inherent goodness.

Like he did with Leia, he carefully holds Rey as she calms herself back to sleep.

It's not Finn's voice in her head, but she pretends that it is.

In the morning, Rey does not wake up on her own. He calls for her.

 _Rey, come to me. Let's go._

Rey rubs the sleep from her eyes, groaning at the stone surface. Living near the sea must make everything damp and cold. It was always a cold, grey-skied planet. She had been hoping the Resistance might accidentally use some tropical planet as a base these last few months.

She does not rise for a minute. There is a gaping window (or maybe it's just a hole in the wall) that bathes the stone chamber in misty white light. She misses Jakku's gold skies in the morning.

 _Rey. Now. There's no time._

Rey grimaces in distaste. She should have known he would be on top of this. Put a man with a superiority complex in charge and suddenly he's giving marching orders.

She also has to ward off this reluctance that she's not yet strong enough. Finn told her Ben had brought her back from Snoke's enchantment of hell. He had loomed over her and sucked out the lull holding her down.

But yesterday she was drained after just trying to pull a single two-pound fish out of the water.

 _Hang on, I'm coming._ She shrugs off the cargo hold blanket. Then she thinks, to ward off his mental shadow for a bit, _I've got to piss, alright?_

He is already outside. The wind is acting up and his robes flicker around him like waves

Rey has no idea why she came to the beach and not gone to fetch him in his cell. How did he remove those chains?

Whatever. He obviously used the Force to get down here. Guess he finally gave up the prisoner charade, for now.

Rey feels she will regret this. Through the Force, Rey does not suspect any ill will from him; he's calm as…well, he's calm.

No, what she regrets is the way he'll handle their first lesson. If he gets bossy with her, or begins to lecture with so much as a flourish about the Dark Side, she'll –

"You're late," he says.

Rey stops in her tracks. So they _won't_ be talking about her Snoke-fused nightmare last night. "I had to get breakfast."

There's confidence brewing inside him. He smiles somehow, without actually smiling. "I was hoping you could catch your own this morning." He steps back so she can see what lies behind him and his ridiculous cloak.

Rey's eyebrows shoot up to her hairline. "Did you just get that – from _there_?" She points to the ocean.

How did Rey not see it? It's a fish, or a whale. Whatever it is, it has fins, a white belly and is about twelve feet long.

Yesterday he was definitely responsible for the small rain of fish that had been yanked out of the sea while Rey, Leia, Finn and Kivi searched for food. He was up in the tower and guarded by two of their own. It was a generous display of the Force. Rey ignores the inclination that he is showing off.

"I hope you're planning on sharing that with the rest of us," she demanded.

His attention is diverted to the sand beneath him. "This isn't for us."

"What do you mean? It's for the lesson?" she asks quizzically.

"I killed this animal myself with no intention to eat it. It's a different instinct, Rey." His dark eyes bore into her.

Rey feels her stomach shake. Before their truce, in the height of their rivalry he used to peer into her mind from light-years away. She wouldn't even know about it until there was a spark of emotion like jealousy (or, occasionally, awe) and he gave himself away. He's sworn now he will stop doing that, but Rey still bristles at his comment. "I know enough about killing."

"Not like this," he asserts. He moves to the side like he's expecting something.

"So what do you want me to do, kill a big beastie like this from the water?"

"Not quite," he says vaguely, enjoying her confusion. "You know starvation, Rey. It's a powerful instinct, but it's also very basic, short-range. There's no control. Those under basic instincts slip up."

Rey shuts down the need to tell him he doesn't know a _thing_ about her, just because he learned she survived on preserved foodstuffs t half the ration her whole life.

"Killing is a primal act," he continues, "But you have to be just a step above that, plan their trap before the killing blow."

Rey doesn't understand. "But it's already dead," she argues, pointing to the dead fish blob. "What are you – "

WHOOSH! This time, whatever swarms Rey's view is loads bigger than a bird. It's a massive flash of mottled brown and grey. Her ears are ringing, there's sand flying everywhere –

 _What is that!?_ Her mind manages to holler through the Force. She's frozen with shock.

"It's a sand shark," he shouts to her. "Kill it before it can take the fish underground." _Or you_ , he adds.

She reaches for the lightsaber she's made herself, but hesitates at Ben's barbed "Leave it!"

A rusty knife the length of her arm, if not smaller, darts into the air. Rey misses catching it. She fumbles to snatch it in a mad fit of clumsiness.

Where in the blue fuck is that thing?

"You..." She stares at the little pinprick of a weapon. "You've got to be kidding me!"

"Focus," Ben chides her, his eyes flashing. "Sand sharks only eat once a year. Their digestive system is slow enough, but my guess is this one's a little overdue by a few months."

The bite in his tone is more distracting than the violent slash of sand to Rey's right. It circles her, to her horror.

She tries to focus on the shape of the creature, its life-force.

"Don't use the Force," he commands.

Rey won't look at him but her eyes flash. _Why not?_

"Billions of other beings who aren't force-sensitive are able to kill without the gift that we have. Don't get all spiritual about this exercise. Match the beast's basic need to destroy with your own. Learn from it."

Rey already feels this attempt is out of control. She's sweating and her legs are quivering just a bit. He's already enticing ( _trying_ to entice) her into the violence of the Dark Side.

Before Ben can correct her thoughts, the sand shark undulates the ground from her. Rey is knocked to her feet – the creature, a thirty-foot nasty thing, is right under Rey's skin. She can't see where its mouth is.

The creature dives and Rey has an unexpected sense to hang on. She crashes into deep sand and loses grip on the creature.

Ben is pacing. "Don't let him get the bait!"

Rey grinds her teeth. She'll show him. She grew up on _Jakku_ , for blummin' sake. He's the son of a _princess_. She'll have the sand shark gutted like last night's dinner.

She runs to the dead fish and crouches like a predator, her knife strong in her grip.

The wide, serrated head of the sand shark rises from the dark surface. It hisses at Rey, who bares her teeth in the same challenge.

"Get it, Rey! Get it!"

Ben whips his head. He is not happy to see Finn and another soldier watching them from the rocks, cheering her on like it's a spectator sport.

He glares at them and turns back to see the sand shark already dragging the fish corpse down.

Ben spits out, "Finish it!"

Rey was wildly slashing the knife in the air, but something made her hesitate. It's like watching the light in a nightsparkler fizzle out.

Ben sighs in frustration. "This is Snoke in front of you, Rey! Don't let him win!"

The young Jedi finally lands a blow to the beast, tearing one of its nostrils. Her heart isn't in this exercise, though.

Ben's ire is like a wave. The beast had reared back in pain and desperately latches onto the fish. It begins to hurriedly bury itself under the sand, but Ben extends an arm and urges the Force to drag the beast back onto the surface.

Sand ripples around the sand shark in waves as it fruitlessly struggles. Ben approaches her. With his black garb it's like he's gliding over the ground. Rey remembers the first time he found her on Takodana, each step closer to her a death sentence.

"The skin on its belly is the weakest," he tells her. "Finish it."

Rey cannot move.

" _Finish it_."

A Twi'lek girl smiles at a piece of food offered to her. In another minute she is wielding a sharp object. A short distance ahead of them is a speeder that caught fire. There is a scream from a lecherous alien.

She blinks, erases the vision that crept up to her. The beast lows, sensing its doom. Its eyes are large and begging –

Ben has had enough. He scowls and lets the animal free. The poor thing is scared enough that it meekly takes the fresh kill and whisks down in a timid dive.

Rey is unfocused. Her hands hang dejectedly at her sides. Ben takes a deep, cleansing breath, but Rey can sense through the Force that he is unhappy with himself, with her lack of dedication.

The rusty knife feels heavy in her hand. She extends it to him.

He accepts it with a slight nod, like she's passed him a fork, and then in a flash he throws it expertly to the rocks. It actually sticks halfway through the rock up the hilt. Rey fights down the urge to wince.

He's pissed, and it feels like it's her fault but she has no idea why.

He's quiet for some time.

"You've defeated…four Knights of Ren." Ben's tone is tight with control. "You faced two of them at once, and killed them all. They were all strong, fast fighters. I know this because I trained each of them myself."

He faces her now with one hand at his waist and one gesturing to the furrowed sand. The semi-faint scar she gave him seems to color. "Why could you not do this?"

Rey is affronted. "It hasn't done anything to me personally. It's just an animal."

"And those Knights? Did they hurt Finn, my mother?"

"They've sworn to!"

"Like you and the Resistance have sworn to murder thousands of First Order Officers? There were almost a million lives on Starkiller Base. I felt their lives snuff out all at once."

" _But not all those people on the Hosnian system_? What's the point of all this?" Rey snaps.

"The point of this lesson was to understand the depth of a real killing blow. Not filtered by self-defense; just a clean elimination."

"That's the Dark Side talking," Rey points out.

"Exactly," Ben confirms eerily, "Which _you need to understand_. You can't go in there and try to overwhelm him with the purity of the Light. He'll expect that. He'll drown you with the Dark. You have to know how to go with the current, not spend all your energy fighting it."

Rey can't believe how rational it all sounds. Give in to the Dark, just for a little bit, just until you've killed the most powerful force of evil in the Universe. It's just as Luke told her about his father, Anakin Skywalker. He had blinded himself with logic that surrendering into the dark would save the Republic…his wife.

"Well, why can't you do it, then? You know so much about Snoke. Why aren't you able to go back in there and finish him off, huh? If my power's so clean and pure?"

She shouldn't have used such a mocking tone, but he's pushed her over the edge.

Ben goes horribly still. It's like when he first locked Rey in that chair in the interrogation room. Rey had shoved him out of her head and tumbled into his, unnerving him. She had sensed his unpredictable nature, teetering between killing or torturing her.

She's more scared of him now. There was a safety in knowing they would always fight each other. Nothing changed. Now there is no direction.

"Don't you think, after spending fifteen years under him," he says in a clear but burning cadence, "that I would have tried?"

Rey wants to try again, but is afraid he will dismiss her. Instead she walks away, feeling less hopeful than ever.


	5. Chapter 5

I Need a Teacher

By TheOneAndOnlySlayer

Chapter 5 complete (updated 9-15-2016)

They are sitting at a crude campfire against the castle's foundation. Rey is leaning against the frigid rock wall with her knees up to her chin. She's still embarrassed at her effort on the lesson today. She was supposed to be the one helping _him,_ make him look good. She didn't expect to be the failure.

Dejected, she stares at a stubborn root that's grown out of the rock wall while Ben Solo looks into the fire.

Ben Solo may have claimed he'd be a terrible teacher, but for now he's wise enough to leave her to her thoughts. She's grateful for that. She suspects, too that he understands the frustrations of failure as a student. He's turned his back on two masters now, she realizes.

The silence would not last. "Have you ever killed, before you joined the war?" he asks evenly.

Rey starts. No one's asked her that before. "What?"

"On Jakku," Ben explains. "I remember…I remember your first memories. You were very good at sifting your memories to confuse me."

Rey knows what he is carefully referring to. When he called himself Kylo Ren and invaded her mind. Rey had reacted like she had been burned and mentally kicked at him. At the time she had been worried he would find Luke Skywalker's location.

She had never guessed, though, that he had been closer to one part of her past.

She stiffens. "What did you see?"

"It's not about what I saw," he counters. He's leaning on the sand with one hand and resting the other on his knee, and with his black robes casually wrapped around him he looks like a noble. "I sensed something that I have experienced before."

Rey swallows and turns back to the curling, silvered root.

"The seizure of movement," he continues in a venomous lilt. "The knife sinking..."

"Stop," Rey whispers.

The former Kylo Ren does not move. "Tell me what happened."

Rey clenches her teeth, ashamed. He will wait all night, so Rey gathers her thoughts.

"You know that a trader used to take me to the mines and the graveyard to look for comm links, converters, personal items, anything. I was small enough to fit into really tight compartments. There was another girl my age, a Twi'lek. She hadn't anyone who took her in. She'd sniff around looking for scraps in the junkyard. Others either ignored her or shooed at her, like she was a dog. The first night I saw her, I did the stupid thing and took pity on her. I even gave her some strips of jerky I used to save after supper. I thought…she could be a friend, maybe.

"But then she started stealing from me. Once she started stealing Unkar Plutt's stuff, I got nervous. Then he accused me of stealing and tossed me around, and I told him about the girl. He starved me for about a week. The next time I saw her, I screamed at her and threw things at her head. I didn't see her for about another two years.

"I was living in an abandoned AT-AT by then. She found me, and she was…more feral than last time. She threw herself at me, knocked me out. She stole the food I saved, some water, and this real neat chrome-covered music player I took home. That would have been about twenty portions of foodstuff and water, would have lasted me a whole month.

"I remember…" Rey swallowed and lost her train of thought.

"How did you kill her, Rey?" Ben interrupted, impatient.

Rey could see the girl, savagely kicking and hissing while Rey danced pitifully away from a dull glint of metal. The Twi'lek was aggressive, ferocious. There had been a fire rising from deep in Rey's chest in that moment...

Rey can't explain this story to him. She won't be able to finish. It would be easier to just show him.

She matches his gaze and crawls across the sand to him. Without looking away, she places her hand palm down in front of his.

His eyes go wide in realization. As the fire flickers, it causes his face to split between light and dark due to the scar.

"You'll want to see."

Ben is stone-still. "I don't have to."

"I think you need to." Rey closes her eyes and brings back the day after the Twi'lek wrapped her hands around Rey's throat, choking her.

 _Rey wakes up next to an upturned jar of…what_ had _been filled with water. It had been chugged greedily and thrown into Rey's unconscious face. There is spittle on her cheek._

 _She's burning with grief, with loss. She feels like a fool. She curses the day she ever took pity on that Twi'lek bitch's eyes and pitiful face._

 _She waits until midday to walk into town. The sun beats down on her but Rey is seething. She keeps her pace even. She'll reach the outpost by evening. There is a small dragon uncoiling in place of her empty stomach. An anger that she has never felt before simmers patiently._

 _She reaches the outpost and looks for the drunks who hang at a cantina. They've seen everything here. They know where the Twi'lek girl will be._

 _They laugh at her determination but as soon as she utters the word "stealing," they point her to a corner behind a tent._

 _In the indigo night the Twi'lek girl's silhouette is chewing madly on a cigar, like it's food. Her yellow eyes gleam in the shadow._

 _There is a rumbling of noise. Someone towers over her and demands what she's doing._

" _You protect thieves who prey on your neighbors?" Rey says carefully._

 _The man casts an indifferent eye on the Twi'lek. "Get whatever she's taken from you, yourself."_

 _The Twi'lek girl has risen, stalking over to where Rey stands._

 _All Rey has brought is a metal rod. It's made of piping screwed together. She tried to beat the savage girl with it last night but the wench had beaten it out of her grip with one swat. So she's found a strip of leather and lashed the weapon around her wrist._

 _Rey doubts there's any water left from the Twi'lek's stash. She definitely wants her doll back, at the very damned least._

 _She can't see very well. Rey glares at the wanton creature and kicks at baskets full of kriff knows what she's stolen._

 _The Twi'lek snarls. She picks up something that sounds metallic and dashes to Rey. She feints, gaining Rey's plunge out of the way in order to seize her by the throat. Rey remembers the panic that she can't breathe._

 _She can't see her, not even the glow of her eyes. She hits the other girl's arm with the rod and kicks the Twi'lek in the groin, and she doubles over. Rey grabs the other girl's wrist for the knife, but then the Twi'lek pivots using Rey's body. They tumble into the sand. Rey's arms burn at the other girl's strength._

 _There are shouts above them, but no one helps. The Twi'lek's headtail tickles Rey's temple. Madly, Rey twists her head and bites it. The Twi'lek howls. Rey uses her elbow to the girl's chin, shoving the body away._

 _The knife! Rey has to get it – where is it? She gropes in the cooled sand. But the Twi'lek grabs the rod, and Rey can't escape. The Twi'lek does something swift –_

" _AAAAH!" Rey's forearm burst into fresh pain unlike anything she's felt before. She looks down briefly at her arm, which is bent awkwardly. The rod attached to it makes everything worse._

 _Rey cradles her broken arm. She fights the disorienting need to sit down and cry for help._

 _The Twi'lek senses her triumph and teases her. She throws down the knife like a dart. Rey winces as it lands in the sand at her feet._

 _She looks up at the savage girl quizzically, trying tof focus on her profile. What's she doing?_

 _It's quiet until the Twi'lek fakes a lunge. Rey falls for it and crouches for the knife. Her other good hand reaches the hilt just as the Twi'lek kicks at Rey's ribs._

 _Rey crumbles into a fetal position. Her broken arm is blazing angrily at the clumsy fall. Rey can only see the Twi'lek's bare feet._

 _Rey didn't think she could die from this encounter, but she feels that she's terribly underestimated this wench's ferocity. She feels sick._

 _Rey needs to gain the upper hand. She lets out a pitiful moan and shuffles the knife under her, hidden. When she's ready to face the mad girl, belly-up, she grits her teeth and lifts. Her other damaged arm can barely lift the rod. It's now feels three or four times the weight. Her palm is sweating crazily around the iron handle. Her whole arm is shaking, begging to rest. But Rey thinks of the days she's been stuck here, waiting for her family to get her._

 _She look up to the stars, the only sign that she isn't alone. Her family will get her. They'll hold her and brush her dirty hair from her face and tell her what a good girl she's been. She'll tell them she's fought off dragons and beasts who have tried to hurt her, like in stories she distantly remembers._

 _The Twi'lek picks up another weapon from her stolen goods and licks her lips. Rey watches the girl's body._

" _You are nothing. You will die here. And no one will care."_

 _Rey can't remember who says these words, her or the Twi'lek. The next second, the Twi'lek raises her arm with a rusty pointed tool aimed at her. When she falls into Rey, she braces her feet. She raises the other hand out from its hiding spot and ignores the frantic flip-flopping of her stomach._

 _There's a weight on her, and something hot and slick pours between them. Rey can feel five stinging pricks along her neck. The Twi'lek has set her sharp nails on her and Rey feels her pulse jumping erratically._

 _She wiggles around. The other girl isn't moving. Her head is slack, like she's sleeping. Rey can't breathe. She feels the metallic tang of the knife's handle like she's tasted it on her own tongue. The blade sticks out of the girl's back. Rey remembers thinking rapidly, like it will help,_ I'm sorry, I'm sorry…

"Oh!" Rey draws away from him. The vision was so real that she's afraid to find her hands covered in blood. Instantly she misses the slight coolness of his touch. A punishing headache is beginning to swell and she feels vaguely sick from the sharp, horrible memory.

They don't speak. The only noise is the fire behind her.

As soon as she trusts she's not going to vomit, she confesses, "Luke didn't want to train me because of that. He saw that and probably thought I was too violent to be a Jedi. I didn't _mean_ for that to happen, though," she affirms, perhaps herself. "It just…she just…"

Rey's reasoned to herself countless times that the girl would have killed her. The Twi'lek wasn't even a bad person; she was just as starving, if not more, than the others forced to live on that godsforsaken sand dump.

Still, Rey can't forget the way she felt as she marched into Niima Outpost to find the Twi'lek. She wonders: did she intend to go as far as kill another being? Is that really how things had to be in her world?

In the past year she's killed Stormtroopers. She's faced and cut down Ren Knights – men and women whom Ben Solo knew in a past life. She feels…

Her whirring thoughts are forgotten when Ben asks, tightly, "How old were you?"

Rey blinks. Couldn't he have noticed?

"I was nine."

Ben is on his feet in an instant. He looks away from her. Like he wants to be far away from her.

"I…" he says shakily. "I think I should go back to my cell now."

Rey is appalled. It's the last thing she expected to hear. "W-why?"

"We'll continue this tomorrow." His tone is flat but he's nervous.

Hazel eyes thin at his pin-straight frame. He can't dismiss her like that. How much older is he than her, anyway?

She feels naked and wrong. She thought that…that he would understand.

Vulnerability turns to anger, but it comes out shakily. "I showed you something I've never willingly shown, or spoken about to anyone. I _murdered_ someone. I…I thought that you would get that. That you'd understand. Why are you suddenly so – "

"Enough, Rey!" He's said her name twice now. He rarely speaks her name out loud, only in her thoughts.

"That's not - !" Before she can get to her feet, Ben has disappeared into the night. She hasn't even checked if she's supposed to escort him to his cell or if the other Resistance fellas are waiting for him.

She doesn't know how to react. She's left trying to understand, why she cares about what he thinks. _He's_ the murderer.

No. It's because Luke saw her as a repeat of Kylo Ren. Jedi do not murder, not like that. Not at nine years old.


	6. Chapter 6

I Need a Teacher

By TheOneAndOnlySlayer

Chapter 6 (edited 9-16-2015)

 _Unbelievable!_

Ben Solo fights the urge to pull his hair out. He is rigid with outrage, but he can't articulate why. The feeling began to swirl inside him until the bitterness made him blind.

He has to hide back in his cell and calm down. He must discipline his mind, rein in his rampant emotions that have tackled his patience today: everything from the lesson's collapse to Rey's confession.

Ben is pleased to see the guards no longer flank the entrance to his private chamber; instead they are smoking and cleaning their weapons while sitting at the top of the stairs. They glare at him wordlessly as Ben ignores them, marching into the sanctuary he craves.

Thank hell he's allowed to be left alone like this. If he were in a real Resistance base, he'd be locked in some claustrophobic cell, probably bound by some maglev pad so that he couldn't even move, spoon-fed by some piss-angry foot soldier who would abuse him, _while_ the holovid cameras were watched.

He relies on this freedom of privacy to better discipline himself. They all must know it's paramount to his…cooperation, yes, but ultimately his recovery. The headaches, the concentration to not lose his temper, the effort it takes to stave off his murderous former master, the sounds of torture and mayhem…he hastily assembles mental shields so that he can just…purge. Venting out his emotions (aka turning on his lightsaber and destroying shit) is no longer an option. He breathes in and out.

It wasn't just that nothing today went as planned. His lesson was perhaps the most symbolic representation of Rey losing her fight to Snoke, and she didn't even try. It wasn't just her attitude, which was a complete reversal from her insipid "I need your help" speech. What has him reeling is her confession that she has taken a life when she was no more than a child.

He feels like he's been tricked. This is more startling than having been tempted by the Light, actually considering returning to it.

The girl has always been a mystery, and he has now seen it as his destiny to unravel her, look delicately through her like a surgeon. Now he understands the depth her power. He _gets_ her. Of course she would have had to resort to the same savage laws Jakku forced upon her.

But how is she still so _good_? So full of grace?

 _He_ had damned his soul far before his first kill. _He_ spent years under Snoke's guidance, secretly learning dark truths. His rite of passage into the Knights of Ren was the massacre of the New Jedi Order. His brothers-in-arms all had hastened to even activate their lightsabers. It was a slaughter, too easy to be called a battle.

Rey was nine! She had nearly lost her life to a girl who had been _packed_ with corded muscle and a heartier spirit to survive. Rey had definitely been the weaker candidate. And yet she won. She lived. She still sank that knife…

Ben realizes with sick displeasure he was still a child hiding in his room at that age. Hells, he remembers pestering _Chewbacca_ to play hide and seek with him…

The wound on his side, the phantom one from a bowcaster, pulses as a reminder. The silvered Wookie has remained the most apathetic to Ben's…purpose here. Ben has not had the courage, damn his cowardice, to look at his fathers' friend at all.

He casts the regret away before it can fester. He still can't make sense of Rey's circumstances. He was puzzled to hear Uncle Luke didn't want to train her. Was he blind? She practically glows from the Light inside her!

Rey had defended herself, simple as that. It was either her or the Twi'lek.

And he knew before she could hide it that there are others she's killed, if not attacked out of the sheer need to survive. Not including himself.

Ben ponders this. A Sith would use this tortured memory as a starting point to her training. All that violence surrounding such a vulnerable person could be channeled to a raging fighting prowess.

She thinks that due to Luke's caution to train her, she's corrupted.

 _Damn the Jedi code then!_ Ben thinks. The whole lifestyle is useless to her, if not undeserving. No emotion for a girl who has been abandoned by her family to die. No passion for a woman who is beautiful and stubbornly kind. No chaos in a lawless world that breeds chaos. No death when it is everywhere; in the graveyards she digs out for sustenance and trade, in the outposts where weaker individuals get murdered for not watching their back, and in just waiting, day after day, for the desert to dry her out.

A more jealous hypothesis brews in his mind. If Snoke had known of Rey's potential, a well of power and strength just waiting to be tapped into, with a kill pegged all on her own while still in the cradle of innocence, would Snoke have sought _her_ out as his apprentice, instead of Ben? Would he have seen what she could be capable of, matched it with Ben's pedigree, and found him lacking in willpower?

Ben wasn't a spoiled child. He was simply born into privilege. Rey was…

He sighed, tired of his obsession.

He meditates for a little while to stave off Snoke skimming around for his lost apprentice. He isn't finished with the girl yet.

ssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss

Rey had lingered at the pithy campfire until she could no longer stand the cold breeze. She trudges back up the hill to the castle and looks for Finn. She's not sure if she feels worse than when _Luke_ judged her.

 _It happened the night of her arrival at Ach-To. He offered her something to eat and she told him about her mission from Leia to bring him back, and for her to be trained. She remembered the brimming excitement in telling this walking, talking, blue-eyed myth that she was ready to be his new student. She tried to remain humble as she relayed how her Jedi powers emerged, from resisting Kylo Ren to pulling a Jedi Mind Trick on a Stormtrooper._

 _He seemed unfazed at first. She sensed his weariness and guilt over losing Kylo Ren to the Dark Side, and all those Jedi learners. But Rey was so sure, she could feel it, that she could help him. She could help him make things better._

 _And then he looked into her mind, and he saw that she had killed._

 _Maybe she hadn't really understood what it had meant back then; killing someone. She had been haunted after it happened, definitely. It remained a memory she would not want to go back to. But what mainly haunted her was how the Twi'lek's eyes came after her, searching for all the weaknesses Rey carried._

 _Luke recoiled from her as he appraised her. "She was a child," he whispered._

 _Rey was so lured into guilt that she didn't think of defending her actions. "I didn't know what else to do," she said lamely._

" _No," Luke said. "I suppose there wasn't. I can't deny, though, that…" and he stood up. "I'm sorry, Rey, but I don't like what I see. You're not a violent person, but…you have tapped into it, more than once. I don't think…"_

 _Luke was silent for a while, clearly wrestling with himself. What a disappointment for him to lose all his students, probably his friends, and to have a shred of hope fall away like burning paper._

 _He finally said, "I can't in good conscience train you in the ways of the Force when I've seen so much…"_

 _She understood where he was circling around but unable to clarify. "You're afraid I'll be like him. Like Kylo Ren."_

 _He did not confirm this, but did not deny either._

 _Rey felt so, so horrified. "I don't want to be like him. He's a monster! He killed his own father, he let five planets…burn apart! I hate him – "_

" _No, see, that's – " Luke stood up and pointed to her. "That kind of belief makes good people turn to the Dark Side. Hate is what caused everything to fall apart: anger, fear, jealousy, oppression. You almost fell for it when you knocked Kylo Ren to the ground."_

 _Rey bristled at the personal reminder and shook her head. She didn't understand; how can hate be completely turned off from a Jedi? Like, they can't feel it at all? "They're human feelings, they can't be helped, especially for a child – "_

" _Which is why there was a system for Force-sensitive children to be brought in at an early age," Luke explained, as though he had hundreds of times before. "It was the only way to ensure no one was compromised, conflicted."_

" _What about the students from the New Jedi Order?" Rey asked._

 _Luke studied her. "Of course, it wasn't that easy. And you shouldn't speak to your elders that way."_

 _Rey pinched her lips, but it barely lasted two seconds. "Wait a minute, your sister told me you were a moisture farmer on Tattooine! Your home's never been raided before? You were nineteen when you learned about the Force!"_

 _Luke actually scowled. "All right, all right, settle down."_

" _I'm not, I know, I'm not upset," she rattled on. "It's just…it sickens me that I could ever been seen as equal to a murderer. A mass murderer. He doesn't deserve to – "_

" _You're angry, Rey." Luke cut in, collectively placid again. "You're angry at a man who had everything and cut it all down. You're angry that you were abandoned and you feel envy. You've tapped it down, forced it down, but it's still there. You can't ignore it."_

 _Rey was convinced he was ignoring her argument. She was less impressed with the way he analyzed her. It's a little true; she envied the man she learned was the son of her heroes. She envied that he had a family at all. "Then what am I supposed to do?"_

 _Luke sighed. "Perhaps there we can start. We'll encounter them together."_

 _It had been a long, stubborn night. Rey had been pried at her thoughts and memories, and Luke was resolute; he had gone through every one with her. It was painstaking, and she felt like an inch of flesh was being torn from her at every misgiving she had._

" _I can't help how I lived, Luke," she tried to explain. "There was no one to protect me. No one to keep me innocent. I tried to be, I really did…" she shook her head. "But if I knew…if I knew all of this was waiting for me."_

" _Power?" Luke offered, though his face was tight._

 _Rey shook her head. "No. I don't want power. I want to be left alone, really, sometimes. I mean responsibilities. And…friends, and happiness and hope. I made a friend and he came to rescue me!" Finn's open smile and wide eyes flooded her suddenly, as did Poe's smile and Han's gruffness. "I met your brother-in-law and he offered me a job, and your sister is so kind and…and I never had that!"_

 _She cried then, missing them all so much._

 _Luke pitied her and shuffled across the grass to offer some comfort. He rubbed her shoulder and back, talking in a soothing timbre that almost made Rey want to lean into his chest and stay there. But thank kriff, she wasn't emotional for long._

 _Luke finally sighed and said, "I don't think I can help you."_

 _Rey ignored the drop in her stomach. "It's okay. Leia just wants you to come home."_

" _No, I mean…I don't think I'm the one who can help you." He didn't look apologetic at all and his eyes brightened at an idea. Rey watched him get to his feet and call out. "Father. Father, come out please."_

 _Rey, puzzled, looked around where he spoke. She thought they were alone._

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Rey is thinking of all this when Finn comes to her with dinner.

He's in a genuinely merry mood this evening. "I wasn't sure what you wanted," he says with mock-seriousness as she presents the same fish plate as yesterday. "I hope you like it."

Rey forgets her sullen mood. "Did you spend all day thinking that one up?"

Finn tsks. "Yeah, my whole datapad's filled with crap. Us non-Jedi folk have to pass the time somehow."

Grunting, Rey wraps a blanket around her and eats.

"So how'd it go?" Finn says as he joins her. "Besides the fighting an underground fish part. Didn't look like you were enjoying it."

Rey chews for a while, sifting the meat in her mouth for bones. "Whole thing looked like he was being a show-off. But, I think I got what his first lesson was about."

"What was it?"

Rey thinks of the fear in the sand shark's eyes. It had been real, even though she made sure not to tap into the Force. "To understand the basic instinct of killing. Like, knowing how blind it makes people, including Sith, I guess."

Finn levels her with a glare. "This is less than a day after he claims he's fighting for us now?"

Rey tries to find an explanation. "He's not lying about that."

"He may not be planning to return to the Dark Side, but what about turning you into a Sith?"

Rey swallows. He can't think that. "That's pretty out there, don't you think? I thought yesterday you wanted to believe?"

"That," Finn responds hesitantly, "was before seeing him this morning. He looked…fixed on you."

Rey takes a deep breath. The room starts to feel too small. "He…" she croaks out. "He's nothing like Snoke. He's…it's like, I feel his anger, or what used to be there. It was like a blaster going off on its own. Pretty erratic. The other guy… he's everywhere. He's like a storm, a massive hurricane in the middle of nowhere, and you've got nowhere to hide. He's everywhere." She points to Ben's cell "That man's not even a pinprick, Finn – "

"Hey. Hey, I'm sorry. I get it." Finn senses her anguish and rubs her back. Rey has had a confusing day and she leans into him.

"Kriff. Where is he, anyways?"

Rey lowers her eyes and shakes her head. She senses his frayed but functional presence close by. It's been pretty much unspoken that, as the one most likely to take on Kylo Ren without getting killed, she's the real watch guard keeping an eye (or in her case, a mind) on him. "He's inside. He's been meditating."

Finn is pensive. "He's been doing that a lot."

"Would you rather have him do the other thing?" she asks pointedly.

Finn snorts. "All right. What is he teaching you tomorrow?"

"That," says a soft commanding voice behind them, "Is what I hope to discuss tonight."

Ben Solo stands in his usual black at the doorway. It is so dark inside the abandoned building that his pale face may as well be floating in the air like a specter. "I need to talk to you."


	7. Chapter 7

I Need a Teacher

By TheOneAndOnlySlayer

Chapter 7 (edited 9-16-2016)

It's weird how Finn doesn't feel the urge to jerk to his feet at this Kylo Ren-shaped man anymore. He's only seen Kylo Ren twice after Starkiller, but Rey's fate has been more tangled with this pieced-apart man than anyone, save his family. The flight back…with Luke dead and Rey unconscious, in Kylo Ren's arms…Finn will never speak it aloud to anyone else, but he was relieved the knight became so neutered, harmless.

But then his spine tingles in the cold and Finn _remembers_.

Rey's face is guarded but her hazel eyes are a little hard. When Finn looks back at "Ben" (it's taking him a while to call him that, okay?) the man's cold eyes linger in Finn's direction.

"Alone," he ventures.

Now Finn schools his face to impassivity. He ignores the way his fused metal spine vies for attention. Next to him Rey gingerly puts her plate down and laces her hands together. "I'd rather Finn stay here."

Ben tilts his head. "Are you sure about that?"

Rey's mouth parts a little. She casts a nervous glance Finn's way.

Ben does not wait. He steps in and kneels in front of the pair.

"If you are concerned with how today's lesson went," Ben studies his gloved hands. "Perhaps it's best to say…we had a rough start."

Rey snorts and glares at him. "Understatement, at best."

A shadow of an apologetic grin marks Ben's face, making Finn stare. "I didn't think sinking back into meditation was needed," he attempts to justify. "You were soundly beaten at an unfair fight. I saw a chance for you to regain your…bold fighting spirit,"

This is all so weird. Old Kylo Ren didn't normally talk this quietly. New Kylo Ren acts like he is dancing around saying "I'm sorry" or something.

Rey appears clouded but rises out of it. "Um. Perhaps you can tell – us – what you plan to teach me tomorrow."

Ben is uncomfortably silent. In a few seconds he stands up and studies the walls around them.

"This is proving to be more challenging than I thought. I don't think it's right for me to assume everything about you, as a student."

The way Rey wraps her blanket around her, hoists her knees to her chin and gazes up at their former enemy is too receptive for Finn's taste.

"Snoke continues to look for me – " he turns around before Finn plants his hands on the floor, ready to rise. "He will not find us here. I've all but severed the connection," he reassures them.

"Why not just sever it?" Finn demands.

"We'll need it. How else can I procure valuable information from him?" Ben rests his eyes on Finn and explains with a patronizing air, "That's why I'm in deep meditation all the time. The effort is taxing."

Finn looks at Rey, who is suddenly interested in a spare thread on her sleeve.

"What does Rey have to do? She knows what Snoke will do to her." He mentions the nightmare coma thing to gain her attention. "Is there a way to learn how to avoid that again, like mentally push it out of the way?"

Ben's mouth is firm. "Snoke has used this technique on me before. It's a way to…subdue us. He's never taught it to anyone. But I can try."

Finn can imagine Kylo/Ben, this towering spirit of impetuous hatred be stunned into nightmares as punishment. He cannot imagine what kind of nightmares he would wake up screaming from. Does he perhaps think of his father, Han Solo, or the billions of voices from the Hosnian system closing like a vacuum?

Both of the men turn to Rey, who is pale and gaping.

Ben elaborates, "I can show you how he will fight. I can help you adjust to his power, expect his next move, but beyond that…"

Rey remains still as a cat, afraid to give herself away.

Just as Ben begins to fidget he reminds her pointedly, "You asked me to help you."

"I know, it's just – shit," she mutters with a sad smile. She covers her mouth like she's about to vomit.

"You're not going to attempt _that_ tomorrow, are you?" Finn says in a tone that means, _you better fucking not._

Ben flicks his eyes over to Finn (he definitely heard Finn's thoughts) and says, "I think meditation is exactly what we need to start with." He leans forward to gauge Rey's reaction, but hesitates on what to say. "Try to relax. Contemplate the lesson you learned today and move on. We have no time to dwell on the past."

He exits the room, a swift and restless shadow.

Finn snorts. "As soon as we're off this planet, he needs to stop wearing black."

Rey spits out her laughter and puts her head in her hands. "Oh, hells, Finn, I'm gonna die tomorrow."

"Yeah, it was nice knowing you." The two of them giggle mercilessly, stress from the level of inaction on this rogue planet making them feel airy and foolish for a moment.

They both lie on the floor and look up at the cracked ceiling. "Finn, I have to tell you something."

"Don't tell me you made out with Poe again. I told you – "

"Cut it out!" she wails, grinning. "I told you to stop joking around like that. Leia almost gave me some talk about keeping my legs closed whenever men smiled at me funny."

That makes Finn close his eyes and imagine this embarrassing scene with glee. "Ohh-ho-ho, that's terrible."

"No, I'm serious, I have to tell you something." Her voice shrank to a timid beat. "It has to do with today."

 _Oh, boy,_ Finn thinks. He shuffles to his side and looks down on his friend.

Rey traces the gray dust on the dirty floor. "He asked me tonight about the first person I killed."

Finn watches her small finger, aware it has handled lightsabers, blasters, the _Falcon_ and the mysterious Force with ease. A vague memory flutters back into the present: after he woke up from his spine surgery on D'Qar, he immediately tried to contact Rey, who had been communicating through R2-D2 while training with Luke Skywalker. They clumsily revisited their first adventure together, uninterrupted by dangers. He remembered when Rey told him she felt sorry for shooting at a Stormtrooper on Takodana. She may have killed him and feared he had possibly known Finn.

"You mean on Takodana?"

"No." she licks her lips nervously. "There was someone else."

A vision of Rey beating the kriff out of three grown men at once on Jakku emerges in Finn's head. "Did he ask you about it?"

"Yeah. I'm…I'm telling you because it's not fair that _he_ knows." Rey is careful to focus on some part of the ground, or Finn's jacket, anywhere but his face. She tells him in soft-spoken bursts of confidence about the girl, about how killing her felt like a game gone horribly wrong. Showing him like she did with Ben Solo would not be…that vision was too graphic, meant for someone like that man to handle. She didn't want to ruin Finn's opinion of her. She cared about him too much.

"I couldn't – I couldn't tell you because…I don't know. Everyone back at the base – Poe, Snap, Jessika – they're all thinking how good it is that they have a Jedi on their side, and if they knew Luke didn't even want me – he saw me as – "

"Hey, come on, Rey," Finn says intensely. "You're not evil. Come on!" Rey, a Sith?! It's laughable! Finn's never felt more strength and kindness from one person before (despite being surrounded by same-faced Stormtroopers all his life). Anywhere the two of them go, Rey's always found a way to help someone. He's seen this girl Force-push back six Stormtroopers on _hoverbikes_ one moment, and then shout at a moving caravan of 200 to stop for a stick-legged baby mydik to cross their path. She may have had a rough upbringing, but her compassion is supremely evident.

Rey shrugs off his reassurance.

"Rey, hey, look at me." When she does, he softens his voice. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry you had to go through that. You were a kid, okay? I don't know what it's like, growing up in a place like that, but you did nothing wrong. You're a good person. You want to know how I know that?"

Her hazel eyes flicker as she shakes her head.

"Because you held onto BB-8 when you could have handed him over for food portions."

Rey blinks, having forgotten about that.

"And you're a Jedi now. Have you used your Jedi Mind Trick to get extra servings of dessert from the cook? Or asked to look into someone's mind, like Leia's or even Ben's?"

Rey has explained that the most she can do is sense other people's emotions more than intellectual thoughts (at least when she doesn't concentrate really hard). Still, she feels…well, she feels relieved that she's got this burden out of the way.

Finn's reassurances do not cure the brewing concerns in her chest. It doesn't really matter that she's a nice person or that she wouldn't want to hurt anyone. Anakin Skywalker, Luke's father and the man who became Darth Vader, was kind and compassionate once. And so, she understands from Leia and Luke, was Ben.


	8. Chapter 8

I Need a Teacher

Chapter 8 (updated 9-17-2016)

By TheOneAndOnlySlayer

That night the ocean pounds into the coast. Rey feels every crash of water like a headache. Finn is asleep. She envies him. Stormtroopers, even former ones, must not be able to dream.

Snoke's voice curls like smoke all around her, and crescendos like the howl of a firestorm. Her head is reeling and her body, now strong, aches from the memory of feeling as weak as a stillborn.

Tonight the voice is stronger than whispers. She pretends furiously she is not hearing: _you cannot save them all. One by one, they will fail you._

She casts a pleading look at the ceiling. _Please, let me sleep. Please._

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Upstairs Ben is sharpening a stiletto knife with a stone. He's done well keeping it together his first day. The meditation and the, well, the _other_ thing helped him. His entire being is tired from holding off Snoke's mind search. He has to squint his eyes to keep away an imagined heat from his old cross guard saber. If only there were a way for him to drill a hole into his head and relieve some pressure.

To be honest, he feels stretched out like the center of a spider's web, pulled apart in multiple directions. He keeps his Force-presence at a low hum so Snoke can't pick him up. He keeps the familial cradle of the dark out of his soul. The Force threads and tightens through him. He is determined to handle the stress.

He hears her voice through the Force distantly. Rey is a sharp contrast in that she is lost at sea with her fears. He exhales in frustration. _Keep her away from me._

Her nightmares are a distraction. Her balance in the Force is very much off-kilter. It's like how the moons and other neighboring planets became thrown off their axes after Starkiller Base destroyed the Hosnian system.

He does it out of necessity to her training tomorrow, he reasons, as he extends one more tendril, gauze-thin and gentle, to send her into a dreamless, tranquil sleep. He needs her to be strong.

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The next morning, Rey finds Ben again out on a cliff overlooking the ocean, which crushes the beach with whitewater. Instead of the two scowling, lackluster guards who remain out of sight, Kivi sits perched on a rock, smacking his lips as he eats a fruit. There is, of course, a blaster aimed at Ben Solo with his spare hand.

"Mornin', Rey of sunshine!" he says brightly.

Rey smiles. "Morning, oddball."

Unlike yesterday, Ben is missing his outer robe. He's just dressed in his pants, boots and black shirt. It's a little weird because the skin on his collarbone and forearms is exposed. He's always covered himself, not unlike Rey's former garb to keep out the sun on Jakku. Even his ears were hidden by his wreath-like hair.

Ben saves her the trouble of awkwardly starting a conversation. "You didn't sleep well last night."

Rey sits down in a clearly unmeditative pose, palms on the ground and legs splayed out. "I don't remember how I slept," she dodges.

It's a curious reverse in roles: sometimes, when Ben's – well, Kylo's – been able to reach out to her through the Force, he could actually manifest his presence into a manifestation of his physical self. Occasionally his face (always his face, never his mask) would be battered with a fresh bruise or cut, or maybe he'd limp. Rey would ask what was wrong with him and he would swiftly dodge the question.

Ben faces the ocean. He looks paler than last night, and the sun is gentle today for a change. Perhaps he didn't sleep so well either. "You dreamed of all the things you feared most. Snoke found all of them and made you fall into each one. He will do it again, and you need to be prepared for it."

Rey takes a deep breath. "By…revisiting them."

He looks at her, the wind ruffling his hair. "Don't let them control you."

As if it was so easy. Rey shifts into a meditative pose and attempts to calm her mind; look through it like it was a large map with all the parts of her life in front of her.

She doesn't _fear_ Kylo Ren anymore. He had devolved into a threat that kept bothering Rey, really, a nasty chore that prevented her from being able to protect her friends. The dangers of Jakku had faded from her amidst the First Order, too.

She gingerly pokes through the tightly-wrapped images from Snoke's Force-induced nightmare. At first, everything is so dark. The dark smothers her, hanging against her skin heavily. Then it lifts to show horrors: blood and lightsaber burns are everywhere. Bodies litter the floor, a small mountain of them as X-Wings and TIE fighters are torn apart by some invisible deity in the sky. A sea of screams endlessly erupt below.

The first time she saw this, she refused to look directly at the faces of those who had fallen. She knows them _all_ : enemies and friends alike. It's utterly gruesome everywhere she looks. There's nowhere to rest her burning eyes but up.

There's someone up there, but she's unable to hold on anymore. Rey tears herself away, leaning on the grass and breathing heavily.

She's desperately shaking her head. She's actually _choking_. "I can't – "

Ben is right next to her. "Easy. You're by the ocean. Let it fall away." His voice is like bristled steel and she holds onto it, letting the memory fall away like extra weight.

"It gets easier. Calm yourself," Ben warns coolly as he watches her in concern. He does not touch her, does not comfort her when he knows it is not wanted.

He goes right into lecture mode. "There are several circles. The stronger the fear is, the deeper he will go to find it, and the least likely you'll be able to fight them.

"The first thing that manifested, right as soon as you fell under: what was your first fear?"

When she catches her breath, Rey hastily tries to put together her thoughts. She's all over the place, like a puzzle that _she_ threw into the air and shattered around her.

"Water!" she chirps.

Ben's eyes narrow. "What?"

"The water."

"You're from a desert planet and you're afraid of water?"

Rey looks out to the ocean. _He doesn't have to be an arse_. "You know when you're in it, and your head's underneath for so long that you can't even breathe?"

Ben looks at her strangely. "Drowning?"

Rey heard this word before. "Yeah."

"Do you _know_ how to swim?"

She tries to look a little dignified. "I…I learned how to swim a little bit. Luke and my friends tried to teach me, but I kept freezing up." And then Poe had to dive in, shirtless while some of the female pilots and mechanics looked on in distaste, and rescue her. Rey remembers how quickly he hooked an arm around her own chest to haul them both at the edge of a pool, and how stupid she felt.

"When did you first experience this?" Ben asks.

Rey inhales a fresh width of air. "I was caught stealing food on Jakku one day. These guys who were passing through had a tent to themselves and had a trough full of water. A kriffin' trough of it, like sand couldn't get in it or like it was a damned bath. Delusional sods. They caught me filling my canteen and held my head underneath." She had screamed and felt the water flood her mouth, and her nose, which may have been hot rods poking far up. An unusual pain. "Never thought you could die like that."

"How did you fight them off?" Ben sounds as if he's generally interested.

Rey scratches the back of her head awkwardly. "I dunno, I passed out a little. When I came to, they were all on the floor."

She watches as Ben frowns. "That makes no sense."

"Just telling you what I saw."

"Can you swim _now_?"

Rey hesitates. "I can keep my head above the water and kick to keep moving, but that's about it."

Ben strides away, at a loss. "What an accomplishment."

Rey crosses her arms. She watches as the older man muses. He paces carefully, his long arms unable to stay in one position for more than fifteen seconds. When he bends over to pick up a few pebbles, he levitates them all in one hand. They orbit each other in some complex pattern. Rey watches them, momentarily entranced. In another blink she notices a fresh red scar running from the crook of his elbow and under his shirt. Where did it come from?

After a few seconds the small stones are shot forward and into the sea below.

Ben looks out into the horizon with clarity. "You do not trust yourself."

Rey almost scoffs. She really wants to say, "Says the man who's trained to kill Jedi for fifteen years and can barely beat me," but she didn't want to throw away the integrity of today's lesson.

Suddenly Ben leans far too close to her. "Although I don't know which is worse for a Jedi: not trusting yourself, or not trusting your _master_."

"You're not my _master_." Rey's eyes blaze at this man, then says pointedly, "My master was murdered four days ago."

"But he wasn't your master, was he?" Ben argues pointedly. "He didn't even want you. He thought you were a threat. Your words."

Rey is flummoxed. He hasn't taunted her since he last used his red lightsaber and called himself Kylo. "He changed his mind eventually," she says lamely. "I mean, he had to train me – "

" – And he did a sterling job," he mocks. "He had you perform breathing exercises for hours and showed you how to stretch before lightsaber combat… but didn't teach you how to _swim_."

Rey's jaw drops. "What the kriff is this? There were kind of _more important_ things to teach me! Like learning how to shut you up," Rey bit out. _This dick._

"I have no time to fix all of my uncles' mistakes." His tone is jarringly superior as he turns back to the cliff. "And you know the basics anyways." He reaches up and behind him, fingers curling around the back of his shirt like he's about to pull it off. He hesitates, then leaves his shirt on. _Good_ , Rey finds herself thinking. He bends one knee and then the other as he slips off his boots.

Rey stares at his back, puzzled. "So, what, are you going to teach me how to drown?"

"No. To surrender." Ben holds his hands out, an unnaturally youthful confidence brimming in his body language. He backs up a few steps, dangerously close to the edge, until –

Rey gasps. Ben's black form and pale face drop suddenly. He actually jumped, but Rey cannot believe it. She runs over, skidding carefully at the edge.

He has jumped. There's a pop of white foam at his descent. She's breathless.

"Oh, shit." Kivi hops off the rock with the half-eaten fruit. "Am I supposed to go after him, or you?"

Rey rolls her eyes. She only had a few "lessons" with Luke on how to swim. It was okay. He had only taken to the water as much as any desert creature has, with reluctance and the most basic necessity.

It had been a little laughable. He instructed Rey to learn how to hold her breath underwater, and how to submerge herself completely under, if only in the shallow end. She would huddle down into the normally waist-deep water and try to count to one hundred. She'd get as far as fifteen until she had to stand up and sputter.

There was…so much water below. It had to be really deep. The water would swallow her and pull her into the abyss. This was suicide.

But hells, that was the point.

Rey has to smile wryly. If he really is trying to kill her, she deserves it.

 _Surrender. Let the fear move around you, then feel it slide away._ His words are a warm but shivering breeze through the Force. _It does not control you. It is only courting you._

His pale face is a small blur below, but she can tell through the Force that he's challenging her to follow.

She smirks. Two can play this game.

She grins at Kivi, moves back ten paces. Then she removes her outer layers and shoes. She runs and jumps, feet tucked in.

She's in the air for a few seconds that are pregnant with unease. There is only the bleached white of the sunny sky, and then a field of blue-grey.

When she hits the water, it's hard and disorienting. Her senses freeze. IT'S COLD! Biting cold. Damn COLD everywhere. Another minute and it will be numbing so she can mistake it for warm, and probably die.

But it's still like knives plunging into every pore. Not _fair_. Her nose hurts first. Then her mouth, tightly closed, burns a little.

She fights the immediate discomfort that claws from within. _Hold your breath!_ She hushes the instinct to panic, to scream, and pictures it as some foreign thing, falling away from her like a current. She is still, peaceful. The water around her is like her first 'fresher, blissful and a balm.

The stillness is so unlike the rough desert hands that first held her down in the trough. It feels like a blanket: the muffled sounds of the deep, of fish and other creatures slithering through, calm as space.

This dark…it's comforting, too. Like sleep.

Someone grabs her. It has to be Ben's hand around her waist. Rey flinches at the contact that's so close to her breasts. They break the surface together. She sucks in air clumsily, the seawater stinging her eyes.

They're so pressed together. He wipes her hair from her face, her eyes, like she's a child. His hands are large and soft. "You all right?"

She's nods, coughing and swallowing salt.

And then something unbelievable happens. He smiles at her. The rays of the sun are bouncing and blotting everything in her vision. The water makes her sight difficult but she can see the flesh of his mouth, nose and chin. He's definitely smiling at her.

Its…

"Did you feel it?" he asks. She blinks away more saltwater hanging on her lashes. She feels him softly kicking his legs underneath, the water swirling around her. His hair, normally a flared mane, sticks close to his skull and behind his ears. Droplets stream down from his nose, forehead and neck.

Rey has to think, not expecting such an intimate bubble between them. "A little. I felt calm." She feels around through the Force how deep the water is. It bounces back to her and she thinks no one could reach the bottom without some apparatus. Or drowning.

"I felt you slip. Your lungs burned," he said calmly. "There was peace in you as you let your fear fall away. Well done."

Rey shrugs. She guesses she did it. She realizes Ben's hands are clasping her arms to help keep her afloat. He's…close. And his shirt's sticking to his…

She lets go of him and pushes away a little. _Just tread water._ The beach is easily within reach, as long as she doesn't tire first.

She jokes as she determinedly angles her head above the lapping waves. "One down, right?"


	9. Chapter 9

I Need a Teacher

By TheOneAndOnlySlayer

Chapter 9 (updated 9-17-2016)

"There is a technique I learned on how to counter a negative memory," Ben tells her as they continue to tread water. They haven't swum back to the beach because it's a good opportunity for her to strengthen her comfort to the water (according to her "master").

Rey holds back the need to hack all the seawater that keeps leaping into her mouth and nose. "What's that?"

"When you feel you are experiencing a painful or fearful memory, you imagine a positive contrast related to it. In this case, you shared the first negative thought with water where you almost drowned. Tell me of a positive experience you had with it." Ben looks so strange wading in front of her, even if it's just his head and shoulders. He's not strictly managing his movements. He's letting the current bob him up and down, which is odd.

Rey thinks. The obvious choice would be any time she _drank_ water during the day on Jakku, but that's too simple. There's no pleasant memory of it. It was just a need, a necessity. There's no happiness connected to it.

Actually, this may come out as personal, but the first time she felt water as somewhat joyful was when she was took a real 'fresher. It was unexpectedly blissful. Rey, a desert creature who never felt safe being naked in her own private home, had never felt water all over her body before then. She remembers shrieking at how quick it all sprayed out of the nozzle, and the sensation of being totally bare in a bathroom, even though she was assured by the female staff that it was her private bunker for the night. She felt like she was doing something wrong, like spilling fuel around the sand and lighting it on fire for kicks. She could change the temperature and the pressure any way she wanted, and she had hung her mouth open to guzzle down the water. She was like one of her succulent flowers, swelling with rejuvenation at the feeling. She never felt so…right, so at ease with her own body before. She remembered looking down at it, and then in the mirror nearby, hair slick from soap and the damp, thinking, _that's me. That's my body. I look like that._

There are others. As she looks back at Ben's expectant face, she remembers another moment. They had dueled on some old Empire base as Resistance members evacuated. Rey had followed Kylo Ren calling to her and they met to duel in some caves.

The impact of some TIE fighters bombing the shit out of the base provoked a cave-in and the two had been stranded together. It was one of the most hopeless times in Rey's life, feeling she was going to die next to her sworn enemy. Who had a broken leg, by the way.

They had remained on opposite ends of the underground chamber. Rey had slumped and concluded that continuing their duel was pointless. Her arm was dislocated, and all they had for food was the rations Rey always stubbornly squirreled in her pack. Proposing a temporary truce had been awkward, but definitely needed.

They ran out of water on the second day. Oxygen, and their hissing repulsion of each other, would be the last thing to go.

There had been a trickle, the one sound besides their breathing and shifting in the dust. Rey had stumbled over to it and, like a genuflection to gods above, tipped her head underneath, letting it trail down the crease of her eyes and along her neck.

She had believed for a bright moment that there was life beyond the cave until Kylo Ren summoned a thin, floating stream of all that water out of her reach and into his own cup.

 _Rain_. Rain, too, had been an evasive event to Rey, even after she joined the Resistance. It actually rained once on Jakku, and it was as soft and fleeting as a breeze. The realest rain Rey had first felt was on Ach-to with Luke. It was after a physically trying lesson, and Rey had rested her aching limbs. She looked at the rain, thick as a sheet, and almost felt fearful of it, like she would be swept away just by standing under it.

It felt…oh heavens, it was a miracle. Like stars were flying down on her. It was better than the 'fresher because it strengthened the whole island, all the vegetation and the wild growth around her. There was even a fresh scent, a radiance despite the cool sensation.

Luke had watched her. "Is it always like this?" she had shouted over the rushing sound, soaking wet and beaming. He had smiled for the first time since her arrival and said, "Feels like rebirth, doesn't it?"

Rey's arms slow, relaxed in the water now, smiling to herself how all the worries of her life, her destiny, washed off her in that moment.

There's one more stark memory involving rain. She regards Ben Solo's wet face and slicked hair, preparing for the onslaught of the first time she and Luke _both_ found Kylo Ren in battle.

It was more intense than their first duel in the snow. Rey – Rey had been holding back her anger, but Kylo had anticipated her weak, hastened shields and battered her spirit with cruel words and a nonstop offense. In the thick of a terrible downpour, her screams and sobs at his sins drowned in the crowding storm.

She stubbornly shakes her head and answers, "I have a few."

Ben appears satisfied and leans back, letting the water buoy him. Hells, it's _bizarre_ looking at him in such a relaxed repose.

"Where did you learn this technique?" she asks.

Ben does not answer for a long time. He stares out at the sun. "I've picked it up somehow."

They return to the beach. Rey feels twice as heavy once she stands on the shore.

"Wait here. Come over." Ben waves his hands for her to come closer.

Rey reminds herself he is _harmless_ and she has stood next to him before. Water drips from his hair, chest and legs. She rubs her hands as a distraction and comes over.

"How long can you hold your breath under water?"

"Fifteen seconds, maybe."

He measures her and takes a deep, thoughtful breath. He casts one look at the shallow water and marches in until he's waist deep. "Come here."

When Rey comes in, she watches his hands. "Perhaps practicing holding your breath longer will help you," he explains in a flat tone. "To get you more comfortable with being submerged."

Rey hesitates. Does he mean to hold _her_? That would mean…touching him; letting him touch her.

"You want to hold me under?"

"For as long as you can stand it, then you will squeeze my hand and I will let you come up."

Rey scoffs and jokes. "You want to hold me under; don't lie."

Oops. He straightens, trying not to look offended. He matches his gaze with her and says frostily, "You can always do this with someone you trust."

Oh. Rey hadn't…thought of that.

She may have handed him to the keys to help her get better. They may have teamed up, but…wow. Does she trust him? She trusts him not to kill her. She felt that, and believed it one hundred percent. She hasn't made an effort to remind herself that he's killed people, actual innocent people. She trusts he won't hurt her when he's lingering in her head as she meditates. But….

She approaches him until they are inches apart. She stares at the indentation of his collarbone and Adam's apple again. This man towers over her. He could eclipse the daylight from her.

"Okay, let's try it."

Though his expression dulls into agreement, he moves suddenly. One of his arms goes around her waist. Another grabs hold of her hand, which he cradles between them. For a laughable moment they mimic a dancing couple from a broken holovid Rey found in the Star Destroyer on Jakku once.

There is a strange energy emanating from him. Rey has to muffle it through the Force, because it's distracting.

"So…?"

Ben's head gives a tiny jerk. "I will dip you back. I'll support you. Take a deep breath and let yourself level into a perfect calm."

"And don't drown," Rey tries to joke.

Ben looks skyward ( _stupid, shut up, why'd you say that?_ Rey frets hurriedly) and back to her. "Are you ready?"

Rey nods, breathing in and out. "Now."

He dips her gracefully, his hand splayed against her lower back. Rey ignores a buzzing nervous instinct coming from deep in her belly and chest. The water sneaks along her face, and in a quiet flash everything is muffled. There is only his rippling silhouette, and she closes her eyes.

They do this almost twenty times. Rey keeps going until she's feels soaked like a sponge. They do this until Rey is tired of Ben pushing her to go further and keeps getting dunked. The water stings her eyes. It creeps into the space between her legs until she feels a slight sting there. She does it until the sun warms everything, even her skin, and her hand is fused together with Ben's large one.

All the time, she thinks of the rain. The clarity, the serenity that hadn't existed in her life until then, the gift of nature.

Her sense of self floats through the Force, directionless. The water feels like heaven. It is silent and nonjudgmental. It welcomes her and drifts away the doubts in her head.

She leans more into Ben every time, at peace. The fear, both around her and in the face of the man above her, courts her like a soul ascending into the netherworld.


	10. Chapter 10

I Need a Teacher

By TheOneAndOnlySlayer

Chapter 10 (updated 9-17-2016)

Ben could shake like a leaf at the way he holds her under the tide. His breathing is even, his form still as he looms over her, but he finds he…feels himself drawn into her through their clasped hands.

She remains rigid throughout the practice, bent backward with one of his hands supporting her back and neck. Ben feels too awkward and gigantic near her. She is so small, slight and quick. He has watched her body language in their duels, calculating her strength or her next move, but he admits now he takes a secret, muted pleasure in watching her do anything else. Since their first duel, her scrappy, economic movements have remained the same, yet she became more graceful, elegant. She has bent her neck and back in a delicate arc until only the dip of her collarbone is visible to him. She is steel, flint and driftwood altogether.

All too suddenly he is reminded of the day he found her, after her ruined confrontation with Snoke.

He had been locked in an unexpected fight with Uncle Luke, already fraught with conflict, blinded by his spiraling despair over being discovered by Snoke. He almost thought Uncle Luke and Rey were part of his madness. Then, the old man – both of them – had perked, sensing Rey's demise.

At his apparent concern for his female rival, Ben had begun to feel the clawed vestiges of Kylo Ren, the identity he had veiled himself in, tear more urgently into him. He had followed Luke in a haze and found Rey, on the ground and utterly still.

Luke had got to her first and checked her for signs of life. He lifted her, one mechanized hand grazing her nape, and passed her to Ben.

"Get her out of here," he instructed, like he _hadn't_ yelled at his nephew moments before. Like he hadn't slayed the last Knights of Ren in Snoke's service while pinning the adult, yet still very vulnerable, Ben, with his blazing, noble blue eyes.

And Rey had felt cold, so unlike the energy she normally cast through the Force. Ben had felt like he had been passed a dying animal.

He could not remember how he parted with his uncle, the poor, mistaken man he had betrayed. All he thought of was he could not let her die.

Such a small thing, he thinks as he zeroes in on her breathing, the slight muscle spasms.

ssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss

"What else do you fear?"

They sit on the beach across from each other before meditation. It's arguably quicker, Rey is sure Ben will reason, for him to peer into her mind and see her fears for himself. But what if he slips into other parts of her mind?

Luke gave her training to protect her mind from invading Force-sensitives. He was blatantly impressed when Rey admitted she could shove out Kylo Ren when he first searched her. As advanced as her abilities were, her training later included learning how to distract the invader with bland, misleading, or even false memories.

She's still looking forward to her new teacher searching through her as much as if he were to search through her dirty laundry.

"Besides dying?" she suggested after a while.

"No living thing is passive about life, much less wants to die," Ben says, unimpressed. "Go deeper."

Gods, he's got the superior attitude of a teacher down pretty well. He must miss giving orders. Rey shrugs her shoulders. "I don't know. I wasn't coddled to have fear." She says the last part as a jab to his precious childhood as Leia's son.

"No one is impressed with your barbaric upbringing," Ben dismisses quickly. "If anything, it just proves you should have been destined for the Dark Side, and I the Jedi my pedigree demands."

Rey's face falls at the brutal opinion, but Ben already moves on.

"Now listen, when you feel attacked with a negative memory: things you fear or experienced a negative emotion from, Snoke won't let you simply shake them off. You will be trapped in your own mind, unable to escape the ghosts of your past. That's why it is so important to think of a complement, or an alternate memory at hand. You will have learned, hopefully by now, that once you gather the basics of mental exercises it all just falls together. Things in your mind become easier to…morph together. It's your mind: you should know it better than anyone else.

"Snoke will first pick on your memory of drowning," he reminds her. "You have a multitude of positive memories that can bolster your control. We need to set up all of these for each memory. That means you need to let me in," he says pointedly, "and help you find a strong complement."

Rey knew he was getting to this point, albeit with reluctance. Rey may have given him permission to dive into her head with her for these teaching purposes, but...

Rubbing her hands together, Rey avoids eye contact. "Fine, let's get it over with."

Ben quirks his head like he's semi-evilly pinning her in place.

"You're right, it's easier for you to look around my head than for us to have some Jedi therapy session," she jokes. "Just…"

Ben watches her squirm with a predatory, patient gaze. Eventually he pities her. "I don't intend to expose your every personal moment. We're simply evaluating your moments of strength, of emotional clarity. Feed off of the sensory images that linger as you conjure each memory: sights, sounds, smells. Everything from the way the light touches to the way your skin feels under your clothing, to the way the sand sounds when it's being stepped on. The more of these you have, the stronger it becomes reinforced in your mind, and I, the invader, cannot take it from you."

Rey measures his expression for the truth, then relents. She closes her eyes.

 _Unconscionably, her head is submerged in a canvas trough of water. She distantly registers her scared, twelve-year-old self screaming for help but finding her mouth flooding with water that will choke her._

 _She moves away from it, remembering the calming exercise from today, and the gentle silence as Ben held her under the seawater. Her heartbeat lulls and it gains pace as the scene changes into the rain on Ach-to. Like a symphony from the sky._

 _Then it warps into the negative. There is the indigo night and the knife-wielding Twi'lek girl, dancing in and out of Rey's personal space. Rey freezes up._

No. Think of a positive moment that complements this one _, Ben's voice echoes nearby._

 _All Rey has to do is imagine the image in her mind, the way she moved so fast she can barely gaze at the trees and the blanket of snow. By instinct she summons their first real fight on Starkiller base, in the forest. The sand begins to change white._

No. Something less dangerous. The first time…the first time my uncle taught you.

 _Hmm. That was nice, she thinks. Luke had been immeasurably fast in his robes. She liked how he teased her like a know-it-all parent and really listened to his corrections instead of giving him any snark. He had even let her train against him with her quarterstaff._

 _The air is lighter, more relaxed. There is a bubbling, sweet sensation. She's laughing at something. She hasn't heard herself laugh in a while, let alone seen. Does she really smile that much when she laughs?_

 _She conjures another moment, careful to detail the dim lighting, the late night fatigue and the clinking of glassware and shuffling chairs: at a Resistance hideout she is surrounded by Finn, Poe, Snap, Jessika and a few sudden friends they made at some performance bar. It's after closing time and one of the fellas doesn't believe Rey is a Jedi. He thought she was underage and could barely fight_ him _. Finn tried to tell the man he'd better be careful, because Rey did indeed wrestle him to the ground. There were cheers and moans of sympathy, and Rey can't believe she's pulling these moves out of plain amusement._

 _There is joy that continues to feed in this memory. Rey saw from the corner of her eye how Jessika had lowered her eyelashes at Finn…strangely shy at the gesture she's witnessed, past-Rey quickly distracted herself by talking to a lean, sunshine-haired woman who said she was a dancer. She had put down some drink and grabbed Rey's hand, leading her somewhere on the stage to show her some warming-up exercises she learned in her career._

 _Rey isn't sure why she's lingering on this moment. Is it because she thought the woman was beautiful? She certainly moved her body in a beautiful way. Rey had been captivated, she remembered. She had looked back at herself, hands callused with lightsaber burns and too much discipline, and wished she wasn't trained for warfare, for killing._

 _The melancholy triggers Ben – she forgets he is still there with her, watching as the dancer shows past-Rey a balancing pose._

There is more, _he tells her, and like a discrete tug at her elbow he asks her to move on._

 _Rey folds them both through the threadbare curtains, and suddenly, out of Rey's hands, they're cast in darkness. The seeping, cold metallic scent is Jakku's, and they are enclosed in a claustrophobic shelter of the AT-AT. Child-Rey clutches the quarterstaff when it's no more than two feet long against her chest. There is a howling outside, and a sudden tramping of hooves, speeder engines and shouts, clamoring overhead and outside. Rey can't tell if this was when the pack of Kandar coyotes came looking for their lost pup, or the fierce sandstorm that buried her several meters under and nearly suffocated, or when the thugs who tried to drown her first returned to Niima Outpost years later and…well…_

 _It doesn't matter because it's all of them at once. She's out in the dark in her shelter and there's no help for miles. She tries the technique Ben taught her and thinks of something…something in the dark._

 _But what? She's needed a light to sleep with the dark. Since she was just a kid she stayed with Unkar Plutt, and he kept a few lights on to watch his property. Being exiled to fend for herself had left her with just a spare light that flickered in danger of going out. The silence had been deadly, creeping closer to sneak in and…kill her. Or worse..._

 _A ghost with sun-bleached bronze hair and a cocky grin relieve Rey as she tries to sleep amidst the brushing tide. She's back on Ach-to. Another form, short and terribly wrinkly with wide ears, sits perched above her. He speaks in a funny way and has a grouchy but pleasant voice. When Rey made an "aww" noise, thinking he was an animal dweller, the blonde-haired Jedi ghost howled with laughter._

 _Whoops, not this one! She creeps back, aiming for subtle before her escort can catch on. And then she realizes almost five months ago she and Finn first met Kivi through Poe on some scouting mission gone almost wrong: they had to hide the_ Falcon _in a jungle and cool down the engines by piling stinking mud and branches over it. They couldn't turn anything on in case the First Order picked up their signal. Out in the dark, Poe, Finn, Kivi and a mechanic named Devs all knelt together and huddled in the quickly cooling dusk._

" _Smells like…old Wookie," Poe joked to himself._

 _Kivi shuffled out of the way. "Oh, you mean Han Solo's asshole?"_

 _Kriff. Holy SHIT._

 _Rey doesn't know how fast she's trying to move away from this memory. She's lost her sense of discretion, hot-red from embarrassment just from having HEARD that, much less how she can explain remembering that, when his own_ son _–_

 _The vision again, from Snoke: the small hill of bodies, of Finn's youthful face ripped in agony, of Poe's handsome face still as death. Jessika. Luke. Leia. Even Ben…_

 _There is someone standing up there, but who is it?_

 _No! She's afraid, she refuses to see, what's up there. She fights, struggles in all directions._ Get me out of here!

 _She tumbles out and away so fast that she feels unknown feelings: anguish so deep and bitter it's almost poisonous to swallow, and self-hatred. There is a silvered man holding her…or someone, because Rey had never been this small or this physically close to Han Solo. He's singing to her…_

 _Oh, she...she wishes she can stay here. She's never felt so safe before, so safe that it's like Rey had never_ known _what danger means, what form it takes. This killer has had this, without even knowing how..._

 _Rey feels like that foreign bitterness actually belongs to her. She suddenly can't stand another minute here._

 _It't all right, son, Han's gruff, loving voice murmurs into his (her) hair. I've got you. Dad's got you._

 _In this small moment, Rey clings to this sweetness she fiercely claims she deserves. If Ben Solo really repulsed his family, he should have traded places with her. And just like that, the dragon that had just started to ruffle from a savage girl's outright attack when Rey was nine, it begins to unfurl._

 _She realizes seconds too late that she didn't come upon this memory alone. Rey can't tell if she's separated from Ben. She casts around like she's on a boat without sails. How did she get so off-course?_

 _And then Han's face is torn in pain and despair as he is impaled in red light._

 _Rey is arrested as Han, so sad and tender, rests his hand on – Rey's – face. Rey is already gone in her own jealous heat that she just barely senses something bloom, despite the forced winter in her – Kylo Ren's – heart. It flares angrily, like a wound. You did this! Something snarls inside. You will never be allowed into the Light!_

Rey shouts, jerks to her feet. Even though she's afraid to see his face, she registers Ben tearing himself away from her and severing the connection between them, hastily drawing up mental walls.

Rey blinks, frustrated to find her eyes are wet with tears. She is confused, and her mind is running wild. Why did she have to see that….?

Oh, kriff. He must be pissed. She's…she doesn't know the ramifications of bringing that particular memory of Kivi's stupid bad mouth up. And how she barreled into his own memory of killing his…his father.

Behind her, Ben is forcibly still. "Rey - ?"

Rey waves her hand behind her. "Sorr- " NOPE. _She_ won't apologize. "Give me a minute."

They remain this way for a while; Rey standing with her back to him and Ben on the ground watching her.

When she thinks she's ready to face him again, he does something horribly, horribly wrong: he laughs. He at least rapidly ducks his head, avoiding her glare of confusion. "Oh, shit," he says. "I hope the Wookie didn't hear that joke."

She feels her face go hot, contorted in revulsion. Is he fucking serious?

He wipes his face and turns back. He looks like he wants to reach out to her.

"That's not me anymore."

Rey nods once, but does not mean it at all.

"Come sit down. Let's try again."

That voice. If only he had his mask, and that decidedly fatal timbre. Not this…this face and voice of his.

Rey submits, because she has to. He's all she's got now. She was the one who asked for this, isn't she?


	11. Chapter 11

I Need a Teacher

By TheOneAndOnlySlayer

Chapter 11

They continue the counter-effect technique. Ben may appear as put-together as placid steel, but inside he works to repair a fracture. He is dispirited to have sensed Rey's response at…at his father's demise.

There's no time to seek her understanding. He won't get it anyway. Ben brushes it away with the sand on his clothes, moments before he and Rey descend back into her mind again.

 _He is surprised to see the two of them back on Starkiller Base, in the forest. It is right after she's given him that scar on his face. He is on the ground, the momentum knocked form him. Rey is stalking his form, circling him with a decidedly fatal glare in her eye._

 _And that's when the ground shakes and breaks apart. A chasm forms between them._

What's the purpose of this moment? _Ben asks, genuinely curious_.

 _Beside him Rey gives a noncommittal shrug._ This is the only fight when I wanted to kill you.

 _Ben is shocked to hear this. He cannot believe –_ We've fought half a dozen times and you surely sensed my intention to kill you for all of them.

Or capture me and bring me to Snoke, _Rey explained._ Just…just thought this was something important to me.

 _The vision disassembles into a cacophony of noise. She is with her friends, again. Ben normally thinks he is impervious to this loud, gleeful environment that is expected of him to have had, in anther life. He senses Rey has returned to thinking about her Resistance friends to set her apart from Ben's company._

 _She looks at them fondly, of Rey from months ago and a handsome dark-haired man with proud features. Ben recognizes him with mild disturbance: the pilot he captured and interrogated on Jakku, Poe Dameron._

 _Ben knows Poe from his childhood, mildly. Dameron's parents were fighter pilots with the Rebel Alliance. They had worked closely with Ben's parents. Ben noticed with irritation that Dameron's grew into his good looks. He and Rey are dancing; or, as Ben would judge, trying to dance. The daring pilot is cheerful and holding Rey's embarrassed smile with his own, a perfect gentlemen. The others around them are singing some song that even Ben recognizes from a holovid flick._

 _He dips her, and Rey's burst of laughter is infectious._

 _Present-Rey's eyes linger on her friend Finn and a dark-haired woman their age. Finn looks pointedly at the woman, who is pleasantly smiling and drinking, and the young man stands up, with slowed confidence, and asks her to dance._

 _Well, isn't that…adorable._

 _Ben steps in and provokes Rey's "safe" memory spots to rein in her training. Enough of this stalking; they can't waste time like this. He peers around for any old wounds, things that lie mostly forgotten but have healed badly._

 _Rey is not prepared for this escalation. Explosions bloom around them. Cannon and blaster fire alike threaten to ripple the skin and muscles from her bones. She's never heard so much continuous noise before. Past-Rey is in the middle of a Resistance attack on a First Order hideout. She's shocked, immobile as troopers flood by her. So_ this _is what war is really about…_

 _The real Rey struggles, fumbling for a way out. A mobile cannon carried by two soldiers fires and hits a giant artillery crane. The Rey they are both seeing clamps a hand over her mouth as the technicians trapped inside are burned to death. There is a stinging tremble that signifies their lives passing through the Force._

Do you wish to see more? _Ben chastises her._ Fight my manipulation before it escalates.

 _Rey huffs heavily and searches frantically. The scene falls back to dusk. A dirty, child-sized Rey is laying on her stomach watching something, a comm transmitter that shows a flickering holovid…of a couple dancing. There's music, a song Ben has heard before in his own childhood. He may even remember the holovid itself._

 _Little Rey's eyes are saucers, absorbing the one shimmer of color and gaiety she's pilfered in this barren exile of hers. It is admirable to see how Rey can make a connection between this holovid display and the bursts of noise and fire: the bright colors and lights, as well as the sounds._

 _Snoke would tear up this memory in two in an instant, as should Ben._

 _He feels present-Rey go nearly breathless like she's been punched in the gut. But present-Rey doesn't protest. She knows this is training._

 _Light and heat blinds them both. They are in the middle of a desert, the dunes sloping like body shapes. A five-year-old Rey is stumbling, dehydrated and wilting, under the suns._

" _Where are you." Her voice is so, painfully, soft and pliant. It escapes into the careless dry air. "Where are you. Come back for me…."_

 _A ship casts off into the sky until it fades. Laughter from villagers and thugs passing through seem to mock her. The stars shine in the night, silent but comforting, the smallest mercy Rey will ever get._

 _The sound remains the same: come back. Come back for me._

 _Ben cannot help himself but want to reach out. He could have offered her a home, he is reminded distantly: he could have offered her all the comfort and company in the galaxy. If only she had joined him earlier, in more prosperous circumstances, instead of practically being stranded here on this cast-off planet._

" _I know what you're thinking."_

 _So Rey is still changing the scene; good. There is a voice that is purposefully obscured, but Ben doesn't care. He feels the presence of what could be a friend, but he does not see who._

" _You think you are alone. But let me tell you something, doshka. You will never be alone in the universe anymore. No matter where you are, you will always have one of us, out here, looking out for you."_

Ben is the one who withdraws. He cannot stand it. He feels he is the one being tormented.

ssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss

"You're hiding from me," is all he says.

Rey perks up, annoyed. "Hiding what? My personal thoughts?"

"When I told you to guide me through your thoughts, I didn't expect you to coddle yourself with these sentimental trinkets."

Rey's eyes flash at the patronization. "Hey, I'm blocking you because that's what I should be doing! In fact, that's what I should be doing, making my mind stronger, not admitting what makes me weak!"

Ben drops his voice from a chastising mock to outright admonishment. "This is not a game. You are still afraid to go deeper, to face the things Snoke made you face. These periods of…you mourning your lost family in the sand are not what made you scream and beg for it all to stop when I forced you out of that coma. So WHAT IS IT?!" he finally shouts at her.

Rey has faked brat-like bravado until now. "I don't trust you," she admits. Finally! Ben could shake her. "Those thoughts are my positive ones. I'll rely on them when Snoke tries to tie me down in my fears, but I don't…trust you with…the rest."

Ben dips his head. "You're talking about the carnage you witnessed in battle."

Rey immediately avoids eye contact. "I know that Jedi are supposed to let…let these things go: anger, emotion. Pain, sadness. But it's all so much. Like I need to hold onto it, to feel…it's not right to _not_ _feel_."

Ben is at odds with how to correct her. "To be technical, Jedi are allowed to feel emotion, just not to act on them. It is why… _they_ purge their feelings through meditation, reflection, acts of compassion. But you're right," he concedes. "It is…unrealistic."

Ben curses himself. If only he hadn't lost control and let his damned father's face appear.

Rey angles her head just barely to his. "What do _you_ fear?"

Ben shoots an annoyed glare at her, unnerved at this question. He deflects it as best he can. "I should think that obvious."

"It's not."

He thinks of the injuries he carved last night that line his back and stomach, of the shadows in his cell, and the screams. He thinks of how Rey could have reasoned not to kill him, besides the Jedi training that lies inherent in her heart, and Kylo Ren's repeated mantra to end her life in order to be free from her spell.

He thinks of how he wishes he could have faced Snoke's disappointment, and not have to feel his dying uncle's, his mother's, even the Resistance dummies'. He thinks of Rey finally turning her back on him; how no one, nothing, would save him after that.

"I'm your teacher. It's not for your benefit to know."

Rey is practically bullish. "Um, yes it is. A student leads better by example."

"I'm sure my uncle never indulged in revealing his weaknesses."

"If you're implying his nephew going on a killing rampage and calling himself some dark lord, that's just one." Rey is unforgivably cool, cleaning her fingernails. "I've had other instructors, you know."

Ben momentarily reels and answers the need to bite back. "Peddlers and graverobbers?"

Rey rolls her eyes. Clearly the rubs to her past have no insulting effect, to Ben's disgust.

"You can learn a lot from a thief, you know."

"Can you." He sounds totally indifferent.

"Yeah." Rey's taken on an oddly flat tone that denotes, Ben has noted, that she's up to something. "Anyone tell you how the miners in that detention facility on Krakkauer escaped the First Order bunker?"

Ben is familiar, he was briefed on it while still serving the First Order. Krakkauer had a valuable mining facility near a dam that powered a heavily armed communications outpost. Miners had been rounded up and kept in detention centers to placate the local population, but one day the miners had all escaped and overran the place. The dam was detonated and it flooded the mine, destroying the communications center in the process. It was such a heavy loss, Kylo Ren hadn't been sure it was a lucky thing that he had not been present.

"Yes," he says guardedly to his awaiting student. "It was a massive failure. Allegedly all it took was two underground spies: one disguised as a First Order petty officer and one as a worker within the miners' community to train the militia."

Rey nods. "One spy. And one Jedi. Particularly one who is good at lifting keycards," she smirked.

Ben says nothing. Why is he not surprised.

"I would have expected nothing less," he says with a careful arch of his brow. Inside, though, he is grinning wickedly.


	12. Chapter 12

I Need a Teacher

By TheOneAndOnlySlayer

Chapter 12 complete (updated 9-18-2016)

They break for lunch and Rey returns to her friends for some much-needed company. Ben looks like he needs to brood about stuff anyways, and Rey is more than happy to part with him for now.

She finds the others outside the castle, where they've landed the stolen freighter and two X-wing fighters. Among the handful of Resistance men and women, Finn is bent over listening to R2-D2. Nearby, Chewbacca hunches his shoulders and pretends he does not see Rey.

Feeling the frosty indifference towards her through the Force, Rey pretends this does not bother her for now. At least not inwardly. Not too long ago, she used to feel as vindictive as the Wookie who lost his best friend. Rey surmised enough that the bond between Han and Chewie was more than just close comrades, especially by how he looked haunted and seemed to grey faster. This whole plan with Ben, the son who murdered his father, being allowed to share company with them, really _really_ did not go well with him.

To his credit, Chewie had waited until he had safely landed the aircraft on the coast and waited for their backup X-wing fighters. Ben hadn't been handcuffed and treated like a prisoner of war by the two dopes who guarded his cell every night, or Leia, who was traumatized, or even Finn. Chewie had burst into the bunker where Finn dumbly watched Ben try to treat an unconscious Rey. As soon as Ben had said he expelled the series of visions storming in Rey's head, Chewie had attacked him and slapped cuffs on his wrists. Nothing too rough, like broken ribs, but no one had thought to consider the Wookie was going soft on his pseudo-nephew.

Leia had rushed in to interfere, yelling at Chewie to knock it off. She had hastened to have Ben locked away until she could think of a better plan. All Chewie had said was, "You keep him away from me or I will kill him." Rey hadn't heard him speak since.

Rey focuses on Finn. He's been learning Binary through the droid and Rey in exchange for Finn teaching Rey how to read Basic.

"What's new with the outside galaxy?" she says in greeting.

"Trying to get news on Poe. And Jess." Finn is shaking his head. "Nothing yet."

Rey pauses, an unexpected grin lifting her bad mood. Jess, huh? She can feel his intimacy of her name, the way his breath practically covets it. "Maybe I can search for…them."

She does not say Jessika. Or Jess. She leaves it neutral, just to tease him.

Finn turns to Rey in concern. "You sure it's okay to do that? Couldn't it leave you weak?"

Rey shakes her head. "I don't mind. I can try to let him know we're okay."

Finn inspects his friend's offer. She doesn't normally offer to use things like that for convenience. She's often muttered how uncomfortable she feels about using her abilities out in public with them. Poe's attributed it to how Jedi, from what he's heard, are trained in charity.

Finn personally thinks Rey doesn't like the attention and normally respects her privacy, but it's been a week since they heard from their friends. And Jess. He hasn't talked to her in a while, and doesn't feel comfortable not being able to see her X-wing return with the others in her squad. It's how he knows she's safe with the other teammates. In this isolated purgatory of a planet, the silence makes him suspicious.

"Wait. What if Snoke…?"

Rey looks tired and determined at once. "It won't be a problem."

Finn shrugs. "Okay. Everyone's in that lower-level room in the castle, so your best bet for privacy's in the freighter." He follows her up the freighter, thankful that Chewie's busy setting up an antenna's cloaking frequency device somewhere else.

They go to the bunker Ben had carried her into. She hasn't been back in here since they landed on this planet. She sits on the floor and crosses her legs, breathes in and out for a clean start.

She knows how to find Poe's signature. He was the first. Well, technically, Luke was the first, as part of her training to search for others and communicate through the Force, but on a long-scale search that spanned the galaxy like she was a damned radio, Poe is the first non-Force-sensitive Rey has reached out to. He hadn't been very keen on the idea, considering he had felt violated from Kylo Ren.

Finn's signature is decidedly more open to the search. He's bright and calm, like an even river. Poe, probably because of his lightning-quick reflexes and tireless bravado, is like a bow, strong with tension.

She breathes. In and out. She falls into a semi-conscious state, so that Finn's attentive gaze doesn't buzz around her awareness. Like snow melting, like tea flowers blooming, she _expands_. Beyond the atmosphere, into the vast maze of stars and planets.

It's like hearing for a fly in a room. It's tiny and almost invisible as a pinprick on skin, but it's there, and Rey can find it. She draws further, making sure it's him and not some other daring fella with perfect teeth.

There's a quick disturbance. She buckles down into the connection. It's him, all right. She feels the buzzing around of communication and reflexes matching together in a small but swerving cockpit space.

 _Poe. Poe, it's me, Rey._

"REY! Rey, I can't – "

Whoosh! Rey can't see the explosion, but she can feel it, as if the heat and sudden flash of the flames aren't swallowed by the cold of space.

The radio crackles urgently. "Black leader, the _Dreadnought_ 's advancing!"

"Double around and aim at their thrusters, guys!" Poe's voice rings with a forced calm.

"There's a second one spotted at our 3-2-zero-5!"

"TIE fighters on our tail, a whole fleet of 'em!"

Rey seizes at the newcomer's voice. It's Jess Pava.

"I can't – out – " Poe's voice is losing focus. Non-Force-sensitives normally can't withstand a mind connection like Rey's while in the middle of something, like piloting a fighter in battle.

Right before Rey pulls out of the connection, Poe shouts out one word. She almost can't understand it at first.

"Nabali!" he yells in a strained voice.

In an instant Rey feels Finn's dark hands support her. Breathing heavily, she braces her hands on the metal floor.

"He's – they're – "

"Easy, don't, not yet," Finn instructs, though Rey can feel his worry's piqued. He thinks she's going to calm her breathing, but Rey scrambles to her feet like a newborn and bolts on wobbly legs out of the freighter.

"Wha – Rey, Kriff!" Finn calls out as Rey searches for Leia. The General's usually inside maintaining underground communication messages. Rey finds her, hiding a wince after spraining her shin from running too awkwardly.

"Lei – General!" she corrects herself. "It's Poe and the X-wing squadron. They're engaging the _Dreadnought_! He said Nabali. Maybe that's a planet or a system. I've never heard of it before – !"

Leia's chestnut brown eyes shone with recognition. The _Dreadnought_ , while not as massive or as fatal as Starkiller Base, is the flagship of a series of platform cruisers that are several sizes bigger than Star Destroyers. It's supposed to be so big it can eclipse a small province or a few major cities and block out communication frequencies. The underside of the ship is covered in magnetic receptors that can dampen energy sources from the city and cast anyone caught living below into a stone age. If fighters get caught flying underneath the _Dreadnought_ , they fizzle out and descend to the ground due to lack of power.

Apparently Poe and his squad goons are in the middle of a fight with one.

Leia stares her down. "You didn't…how do you know this?"

Rey put her hands at her hips. "I wasn't under orders not to search through the Force to seek out a communication with our comrades."

"It was fucking implied," Leia bit out, approaching Rey. "There are a dozen of us and only three of our people know the true location of our hideout. The most powerful mind in the galaxy's just killed off the competition and we've taken off with the underling who's betrayed him. How could you think that talking to one of our guys long-distance like that wasn't a risk to our position?"

It's so unexpected to face Leia's ire like this that Rey's mind can barely comprehend what she's saying. "Leia," Rey struggles to add. "We can't be staying here any longer. We've been stuck on this rotten coast for almost a week. How long are we expected to stay grounded?"

"How's your training coming along?" Leia replies calmly.

Taken aback, Rey is unable to answer. "What?"

"Your training, with my son. What is your progress?" Her tone has changed into something deceptively soft.

What have they been working on, really? Rey and Ben have been left alone for the most part since they got here. It's all…a little strange how much freedom they've been given. For the first few days it was evident that they all needed to seriously regroup after leaving Snoke's base. But now…are they on a vacation? Taking diving lessons and fishing? Reflecting on the past?

"We've covered a lot of ground – but!" Rey plows on. "This isn't something that can't be carried on at a Resistance base that needs us. That _Dreadnought_ cruiser is just the beginning. We don't know how many there are, or how soon they can take over other planets one by one!"

"Enough, Rey! Kriff, at least a _ct_ like I'm still your superior," she muttered between clenched teeth as she grabbed Rey's elbow.

It's a little childish how the young Jedi is being led to a quieter alcove where they can't be overheard, but Rey lets it go. No one notices Finn whose been standing by the entrance, ever the forcibly patient soldier.

"Ma'am," she tries. "I've recovered. I'm gaining my strength. I _can't_ allow the leader of the Resistance to stay here on my behalf when they need you to lead them." She's begging, just a little bit.

"We're not leaving this rock until I know you're ready to engage Snoke, Rey," Leia says firmly. "You are the best chance of cutting off the head of the First Order. You will park your ass here until I see you are ready for battle."

Something's off about the woman's stiffness. She's hiding something.

"You…you're worried about Ben." Rey should have seen it. Of course – of fucking course. Leia's in no rush to leave this sea-borne planet when she has no idea how her people will receive the redeemed Kylo Ren. Her son. Her cowardly, murderous son.

Leia looks like she's carefully navigating through a mine field. A politician's grace. "There's more to it than that," she evades.

"Your favorite pilot is in danger," Rey reminds the woman, fuming. "He's been more loyal to you than him. So are others who have risked their lives under your guidance. They need you."

Leia's temper acts quickly to disarm the younger woman. "I've known Poe since his parents served the Rebel Alliance. I've known them for longer than you've joined our cause, girl," she says sharply.

Rey bares her teeth, completely fed up. "We have to help them. People are dying!"

Leia is grave. "Poe and the others are doing what they're trained to do. Your job is to cut off the head, not get killed trying to. Go back to training, Rey."

The former princess's steely gaze does nothing for Rey as she stares off distantly into the grey-white sky. She excuses herself from Finn, making Rey turn to face him in surprise.

She opens her mouth to say something but is struck deaf at her friend's face. He's trying to remain carefully acceptable at their fearless leader's orders. But his eyes are glassy, worried.

Rey thinks of Jess Pava's voice, clamped down and trying to not shriek. Jess isn't brash like Poe. She has this remarkable ability to never sound worried, at all.

"She sounded all right when I heard them," Rey assures her friend. That's honestly all she can offer him. And Finn nods because it's all he can do, too.

sssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss

Rey hates him. Oh, gods, she knows it's wrong ( _Luke told her not to hate him, he's his own nephew, he was corrupted just like_ she _could be_ ), but she can't stand the idea of him. She's disgusted at how he even tried to make a joke about his murdered father… The man who raised him, whom he had _killed_. She hates how he has everything, everything, even still…

Within this storm of emotions, Rey feels betrayed from the secret connection she's felt mature between herself and the General, the fearless mother of a woman who exudes warmth and strength. This woman has chosen _him_ , him above the devoted men and women who are fighting where they are all needed. Not here! Not on this saltwater rock with nothing better to do than to listen to her former enemy lecture her.

She's been reasonable and patient so far. She's tried to be the sensible Jedi adult. But this isn't right.

Why did Luke have to die? Why did he have to leave her with him like this?

She had gone from hating Kylo Ren to trying to understand the man smothered underneath him, to foolishly, stupidly, trying to let that smothered part of him inside. How could she have been so stupid? She's almost sick with having betrayed her own self.

She's marching back across the beach where he has been meditating in the same damn place she left him. All at once, the meditation, the quiet behavior of this man, who wears the same face – the long nose, the wild crown of hair, the sullen eyes – is a mask again.

No. Rey's had enough of meditation, of reliving the past and its pains.

She speaks before he opens his mouth. "I think we should do some combat training instead."


	13. Chapter 13

I Need a Teacher

By TheOneAndOnlySlayer

Chapter 13 (updated 9-19-2016)

Ben surveys the young woman's agitated stance. She's carrying two metal rods. He recognizes them as pieces of her quarterstaff, assembled from random pieces of piping and screws she had salvaged as a weapon on Jakku.

Through the Force, she's giving off choleric energy. He can't possibly see what prompted this sudden change, however it reminds him of himself under Uncle Luke's tutelage.

"You don't need combat practice," says Ben. "You walked into your fight with Snoke thinking that all you had to do was cut him down. He's not me. Why do you think we're starting with these mental exerci - "

The second he finishes speaking, Rey assaults him with her own mental illustration of pain. Ben mildly reacts to the mind invasion, putting a hand to his temple. Inwardly he's amazed at the focused effort; he's practically drowning under the visions.

 _He sees – he_ feels – _people's lives being extinguished like candles and disappearing into the ether. What's left behind are shells, hollow and still. Their bodies are fresh and wet with blood, but it's a graveyard._

 _He, as Rey, is walking through a hospital that was hit by shard bombs; remote-control explosives that burst into hundreds or thousands of tiny shrapnel pieces. There are some adult officers and pilots in their bloodied pilot's uniforms. There are also, he is disturbed to see, bodies that are definitely not adult-sized. Younger…_

 _The scene changes to a valley with a bronze-colored sky. Ben recognizes it as Ultaba, one of the planets where the First Order designed a POW camp._

 _Ben remembers he and Rey met days into the Resistance's invasion of the planet to rescue the POWs. He feels her now, kneeling at the sight of a blonde boy in a black petty officer's uniform, streaked with dirt and blood. His legs have been blown off but his lips are still moving._

" _I'm sorry," he feels Rey's lips move. It's like they're his lips, quivering with trauma._

 _A blown-out transmissions deck with First Order men and women slumped in their seats, all dead. Stormtroopers numbering in the dozens, all lying on top of each other like toy soldiers, thrown into a ditch, an incomplete mass grave._

 _An X-wing fighter has gone down near a beach, the sky smeared orange and gold. Ben-as-Rey hears Finn standing nearby, shouting "POE!" Ben watches the TIE fighter who shot him down arc overhead, and sees Rey's arm hold out, calling to it…and the TIE fighter explodes with the pilot being ejected from the combustion._

 _That last part makes Ben stiffen with attention. She could not have…did she cause that TIE Fighter to explode using the Force?! And the pilot in that fighter was ejected, safely. No…he knows, truly, more than anyone (certainly more than his stubborn Uncle Luke) the depths of Rey's power. She ripped apart that TIE Fighter and plucked out the pilot in such a short degree of time. Unbelievable._

 _There are other images of dead or dying men and women. In all of them, Ben feels Rey's mind screaming for a solution to it all. Why is this happening? He feels her say._

These are ways in which Kylo Ren has not seen her as they dueled the last six times. The other ninety percent of the year, Rey's been baptized in warfare.

Ben is no stranger to violence, but he knows some of the scenes are of the carnage Kylo Ren left behind. And this girl thrusts them full-on into his head, like she's punishing him.

He removes the sensation like it was a mask, emerging. "Ah. Is that what this is about?"

"Why does the First Order tolerate stuff like this?" she demands in a small voice. "What are they trying so hard to fight for? I don't get it."

Ben blinks owlishly at her. Is she a child, suddenly? "This is the order of life. Regimes and civilizations rise and fall all through time."

"But why does it have to cost so many people's lives? Those were _kids_ crying for their mothers in those First Order uniforms. Doesn't anyone care?!"

Ben has no time for this. Which is a mistake to think, because she senses it, and she's passionate with outrage. She pushes him. "No! You _wanted_ me to show you what _I'm_ afraid of. _This_ is what I'm afraid of! All of this happens and the Jedi are the ones who are supposed to choose a side. To lead the way. I can't handle… _that_!"

Ben doesn't know what to say. He can't help her, he's already damned. He won't even try to offer some cryptic metaphor-laced answer his Uncle Luke was so talented at. "I do not know how to advise you on that."

Rey is resigned, the vexation leaving her. "And that's why I didn't trust you with those memories. Because I knew you'd say that."

Well, fuck. Ben clenches his fist where she can't see it (and he holds fast to his mental shields so that she can't sense it either). He watches the tired disappointment written in her slumped shoulders and in her eyes, and he can't stand it. His everything is wounded, more so than in any occasion Snoke used to punish him for Kylo Ren's misgivings.

Damn it all, every piece of him. He's ten years older than her and he should _not_ feel guilty for a lack of measure in her eyes. Eyeing the metal weapons in her hands, he decides that perhaps some physical exertion is exactly what they need.

With a huff he summons one of the rods out of her hands. The movement catches her by surprise, something he craves suddenly.

It's a good call that they won't practice with lightsabers yet. Ben hasn't forgotten that Rey has killed as a nine-year-old, but that intrigues him more than unnerves him. In truth, he's not ready to touch his dead uncle's lightsaber yet.

He won't deny he's excited. He limbers up his wrists, watching Rey stretch from the corner of his eye. This is what they're good at. She is radiant now, eager to show she is still incredibly alive and active.

Rey, on the other hand, feels unable to focus. He's still wearing his black shirt, streaked with sand, but the way it hangs on him is a little batlike. It's funny… and something else she is trying really, stupidly hard not to think about. _It's fine. Everything's fine._

ssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss

By the second round, Kivi's come down from the hills and Finn and the guards are eating their dinner nearby. Their arms rattle from the strength of their blows to each other.

This time, Ben takes out a strip of cloth and proceeds to tie one hand behind her back. Rey tries not to flinch at his close proximity, but his movements are carefully technical. "If you break this arm, you need to adjust your balance with this weapon."

Rey huffs, never having thought of that before. The half of her quarterstaff is heavy in her one left (non-dominant) hand. She's still got her legs, though, and she can kick.

"Now, disadvantaged in a fight like this, what can you do to even the scale?"

"Verbal abuse?" she throws out.

"A large pair of tits," Kivi supplies under his breath.

Finn hunches his shoulders to whisper discretely, "We'll be here all night, then."

Rey closes her eyes in irritation. _My breasts are not small._ She peeks a look at Ben, who may as well have been a statue.

"Let me provoke your attention then," Ben gathers his confidence again. "The last fight on Utapau, three months ago. You had some purple sash around your waist."

"I remember what I wore." Rey nervously pulls at the tie around her wrist and back. "I told you to take your mask off and you Force-shoved it into some Resistance pilot's head. You smashed his nose. He's still alive, by the way."

"I anticipated every move," Ben persists with a glint in his eye. "I predicted them through the Force before you even decided on them. That's why you have that scar on the back of your thigh." He motions with his mock-sword.

Ughh. She _hates_ how he reminds her of that. That had been a nasty fight, full of echoing swears and pretty much being _chased_ by Kylo Ren. "I know how to do that, too." Rey protests, referring to predicting the immediate future through the Force. She had practiced it with Luke and managed to use the ability when fighting Kylo Ren before, but -

"Once you slip into defense position, you become too shaken to concentrate," Ben practically finishes the thought for her. "You give up. Your erratic movement becomes predictable. The trick is to remain in control, calm your thoughts and anticipate my attacks so you can regain the upper hand."

Rey sobers. She knows this is true. It is her usual weakness – both of theirs, really. Every time, they both got ready to rush at each other in battles like battering rams, hyped up and brimming with passion. As soon as one of them faltered just a bit, the clumsy effort to catch up snowballed into a game of predator and prey.

Ben's posture straightens into a momentary salute. "Close your eyes and focus on the moment. Feel everything around you." _Feel me_ , he seems to tell her.

It is often easy to tell where a fire will burn next. He is not the fire anymore, messy with his anger. He is quiet and almost stealthy as the water.

She closes her eyes, levels her breathing, and stills her heartbeat. Even the brushing tide slides away. She feels him, his heartbeat and smooth breaths.

The air around them is like paint on a canvas. It parts as Ben's right arm whirls inward.

 _Get him. Don't do anything fancy._ She does a low-energy block with her one hand, already training her mind to see how he would react. He hurls a hit from above her. Rey blocks this and is forced to pivot out of the way. She sees an opening and minds her footing, waiting for him to lose direct sight of her.

Oh, _wait_ …

She wants to give him trouble. She cannot forget what he was. She hates herself for it. And as for Utapau, he definitely almost killed her, after scoring that unfair blow right underneath her ass.

As his back begins to face her, she spins around to gain momentum. Sand swirls around her feet. She swipes her iron weapon at him, right square in the –

 _Smack!_

"Ohh, fffffuck!" Finn swears right before clamping a hand over his mouth.

Rey won't deny, she feels goddamn triumphant. _Your fear is only courting you._

She watches with glee as Ben stops. She feels the sting of pain from him. But _hell_ if he will give any of them the satisfaction for watching him rub his sore ass. He glares at Rey…then he calls the Force and summons the second half of Rey's quarterstaff right from her hand. He spins them both rapidly and Rey cannot focus.

"Not fair!" she shouts as she steps back.

 _Find the weak spot. All it takes is one strike,_ he directs her.

 _I can't find it._

If anything, he wields them faster. _You must!_

Rey narrows her eyes from the sun's glare, and has an idea. She skitters around him, faking a sense of desperation and continues "listening" to his next move. Ben's eyes are in the sun now. He squints, just barely, but it's enough.

Rey kicks the sand and Ben turns his head. She runs up to land a kick, but she sees him move the two metal swords into an "X" to push her back. No. She summons the Force and slides to swipe him off his feet. It works!

Ben is off-balance, and Rey plants another kick in his stomach to push him back. She waits until he's on the ground before desperately snaking her one arm under his armpit and around his chest and neck like a clamp. It's a wrestling move just to distract him and limit his movement. But the move is useless with one arm tied behind her, and he is much bigger. He flips her over.

Rey tumbles out of the way, stretching her hand out wildly for a spare metal rod. She feels him close in and pivots, holding the stick out right under his chin.

Ben slows, poised mid-strike. His dark eyes calculate for a next move, but Rey is already smirking.

He takes a step forward into her space. Will she hit him? No, she doesn't. He makes a show of sticking his weapon in the sand like he's about to yield.

Rey buys the appearance that he's yielding. Ben is satisfied and seizes her weapon with both hands and shoves it forward into Rey's sternum.

 _Foul!_ Rey accuses as she buckles, groaning. She hears Finn moaning in sympathy but doesn't come to her rescue. She summons the second metal stick through the Force and shouts her defiance with a rapid blow.

They are back to parrying. Rey isn't sure what is fueling her through this fight, only that she wants to see him – Ben, Kylo, whoever – on the ground and submissive. _He killed his own father._ When she pushed back into his own mind earlier today, she had felt so close to what the word "home" is supposed to mean, for any normal person: in a father's arms.

 _Not fair._ She lands an unforgivably heavy hit on his wrist, and he instinctively loosens his grip on his weapon to clamp onto his aching hand. Yes, she hates him, more than anything she's known before. It all comes back.

Rey closes in and thinks where she wants to hit him next. She's ready to shove her weapon into his face, her breath hot, but in another second she thinks she's seeing double.

There is someone standing close to Ben, dressed in dark brown traditional Jedi robes. His hair is wild in the wind, light as bronze, and his eyes are as blue as the sky. They are avidly focused on Ben, whose eyes are trained painfully on Rey.

Rey gawks. She can't help it. She is seeing a ghost.

The young man registers Rey's presence by holding out a hand. "Don't – don't say anything, Just…." He trails off, his face soft with pure affection. "I want to look at him. I want to look at my grandson."


	14. Chapter 14

I Need a Teacher

By TheOneAndOnlySlayer

Chapter 14

Rey gapes at the Force-ghost of Anakin Skywalker for too long. A black shadow has closed in and there's a burst of pain in the side of her neck and jaw.

"Mother _fuck_ – "

Rey's hands fly up to her head. Ben has taken one of her moves and side-kicked her in the neck. The neck!

"Shit! Rey, you all right?" Finn shouts, poised atop the rocks.

Rey's frowns at the barreling laughter coming from the ghost. Anakin Skywalker is bent at the waist, unable to control himself from laughing at Rey's injury.

Ben didn't expect Rey's complete lack of attention. "What are you staring at?" he demands as he approaches her.

Okay, so only _she_ can see him. Rey speaks in broken Huttese. "What are you doing here?" she is aware it sounds like a particularly harsh swear, but it's better than looking like she's talking to herself in Basic.

Anakin Skywalker has a hand covering his mouth in undisguised mirth. "Oh, I'm – I'm sorry! That must've hurt," he coughs.

"You worthless bastard," Rey sputters. Her mouth is bleeding. She's bitten her tongue from the shock of Ben's kick.

"I didn't break anything. Just your pride." Just as Ben cradles his large hands around her jaw, Rey shoves him away.

"Oh, come on, give him a break," Anakin says.

"Don't be stubborn, let me see – "

"Shut up! Just – " Rey pauses, shaken. She spoke Basic by accident. She watches Ben's closely guarded face. His mouth is half-open and there is a wounded look about him. In another second it hardens.

"You want to continue, is that it?" There's a note of stung impatience in Ben's voice. Rey spits a wad of blood out of her mouth, eyes squared on him.

This is blummin' ridiculous. Snoke is ripping planets apart and she's surrounded by these idiots.

"Yeah. One more round, yeah?" she suggests too lightly. In an irritated movement she wriggles out of the tie that held her arm back. She wants to beat his arse with both hands while his cursed old grandpa watches.

 _Finish him_. A voice like smoke and howling desert storms crawls into her very bones.

Behind them Anakin frowns, but doesn't speak.

They go three more rounds until Rey looks absolutely ridiculous. Her neck began to swell until it hurts to turn it. Ben has made a point to her lack of control to keep hitting her arms and legs, to make her slow down, maybe even concede. But Rey is just…burning. She wants to soundly beat this man she can't shake away.

 _He killed his father. He shuns his mother. And he judges_ me _. I'm the one who's expected to kill HIS master._

"All right, Rey, take it easy, huh?" Finn calls out to her.

Rey's ribs hurt but she takes another breath. Ben is bleeding but just at the corner of his mouth and knuckles. He's tired, too. She's had to knock him out of her head for searching her emotions several times.

"Are you done yet?" Ben bites out, his hair half-dry and swept in all directions.

Nope. She's still standing, isn't she? Rey dives in with a growl, ignoring her aching arms.

This is not fair. He is a murderer. He killed Jedi, dozens of them. He is watched over by a ghost who has killed thousands of them, and millions of others.

What trap has Rey put herself into? Finn, too, is watching all of this like it's natural.

Ben has judged her, even if it was short-lived –

No. he still does. He watches her assaults, his eyes narrowed. He sees Rey as the girl who killed a poor Twi'lek girl.

 _I didn't mean to kill her!_

Ben lets her charge and steps to the side, hitting Rey in the back so she falls into the sand.

"What are you trying to prove? This is how Snoke defeated you."

Rey glares at the microscopic charcoal sand in front of her nose. How dare he. So easy it must be, for disgraced, useless apprentice to criticize one of his rescuers.

 _I saved you. Luke and I came to SAVE you, you stupid, ungrateful bastard._ The spindly Krayt dragon coiled around her heart shudders inside. She whips around and calls to the Force. _Finish it!_

Both metal pieces of her quarterstaff fly to each palm. She holds them both out in front of her. Ben doesn't even flinch.

The whites of her eyes blaze as she lets one rod toss into the air. Ben goes to grab it, and Rey swings her weapon to his exposed side with all her might.

Ben sees this vengeful move seconds ahead and locks Rey's strike under his arm. She's stuck. He closes in, tired and more provoked at her…anger.

Hells, she's spiraling just like he used to.

He's determined to show her this is what will get her killed. She's blindingly aggressive, letting her emotions burn her out.

He wraps his arm around her, pinning her in place. "This can't be possible," he says in her ear, the taunt now thick with triumph. "I was defeated by _this_ miserable wench?"

"Stop it," she hisses.

"No, really. Who is this? Who is this sad little desert creature? Admit defeat. Surrender."

That seems to calm her. Her body relaxes, but then in another second he feels her draw in all the Force around her, like a surge of the tide sucking in before a tsunami.

He is reminded of yesterday's challenge with the sand shark, the way it rose up beneath her and knocked her to her feet.

It is impossible, amazing, how she never stops robbing him of his expectations for her. She has coveted all this energy from the ground and in one stomp of her foot (she's so small and slight, he thinks in bewilderment) she's enacted a small, but effective…earthquake.

It rattles Ben's solidly-planted feet on the ground, and Rey seizes the minimal gap of freedom. She elbows him in the gut (right – _right_ in the cut he's made, still tender. _Does she know?!_ ) and shoves the hollow of her palm in his chin.

Ben Solo will not deny…neither would Kylo, whose shadow hides deep down…he revels in this.

He lets her tumble them downward until she pins him on the ground. She's summoned one of the quarterstaff pieces again, held aloft as a warning.

" _You surrender_!" Rey seethes.

Poor girl. She has no idea how far she's fallen.

Ben smirks sadly.

"What?" she barks.

"Snoke would tremble at the look in your eyes," he says almost lovingly.

SSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS

Far away, in a corner of a planet, a wretched life-form heals. His body is broken in new places, but that is not something he is not used to: Chunks out of his face and skull have proven that.

There is no time to heal the body. Subversion is the tactic.

Buried deep in his mind, where the minds of all other life-forms are wrung together, the creature plucks a set of strings he hadn't thought reachable before.

She came to him strong and fast, and left a shadow of herself. Even when she tries to rebuild herself, Snoke must – he MUST – bring her back down. Even as he bleeds, he must do what he can.

His apprentice, he thinks, will be the easier to punish. He is not worth the pain tonight.

sssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss

Rey blinks, feels the tremor in the Force. In her own heart. It's crept on her.

"Rey," Anakin speaks like Rey's on the edge of something. "Get off him. Now."

She obeys mechanically and shivers. Okayyy. Time for a break.

"Is that it?" Ben calls out to her, unsatisfied.

"I need to take a piss," she replies hollowly. She doesn't look back, not at the umbral man's smile or at the ghost's penetrating look of disapproval.

As soon as they reach a mossy hill out of view, she rounds on the ghost. "What. Are you doing here?"


	15. Chapter 15

I Need a Teacher

By TheOneAndOnlySlayer

Chapter 15 (updated 9-22-2016)

 _About a year ago on Ach-to, on the night Rey first arrived, Luke Skywalker called to his father. Rey was so sure they were alone; at least she had sensed this upon landing on the island that afternoon._

 _But like the sounds of quiet footsteps, the new presence tingled at the back of her neck. She watched as a tall, dark brown-clad human in Jedi robes emerged from the shadows. She blinked, thinking the minimal glow was a trick in the light._

 _The man was closer to Rey's age than Luke's. It makes no sense. How could he call this person 'father'?_

 _He had blue eyes like Luke's, but they were bright with mirth. His hair was bronze and bleached from the sun. There is a thin facial scar, so eerily similar to the one she gave Kylo Ren a few days ago that, for a moment, she can imagine this smiling man is him, with his black hair and tortured face. She shudders._

 _The newcomer takes no note. "Hello, kiddo," he says in a big-brother voice like Poe's. "It's nice to finally meet you."_

 _Luke sat back down. "Rey, this is my father. His name is Anakin Skywalker."_

 _Rey peered at the blue-tinged visage. "Are…? No. You're not real."_

" _He is real, in a way," Luke said sadly. "The Force's power reaches beyond death. My father's been dead for a long time."_

" _Though I look pretty good for an old man, don't I? And a grandfather, too," the ghost-shape added as he sat in between Luke and Rey._

 _Rey felt…not unsafe, but a spark of anticipation. The Force can do so many things, she has learned: ghosts, visions, connections through the Force. It unnerved her._

" _So," Anakin Skywalker began. "You are probably bursting with questions. You'll have to excuse my son. He won't admit it, but he's inherited the worst job in the galaxy," he explains with a dark, sheepish look._

 _Beside them the son in question shook his head. "Not the best icebreaker, father."_

" _Well, we can't exactly dodge around with any half-truths," the ghost suggested. "Look at her. She couldn't have come at a better time. And you're right," he said, laying a gentle, knowing look at Rey. "She's a lot like me."_

 _Before Rey could ask what that meant, Anakin leaned forward. "Tell me, doshka," he said, surprising Rey with his knowledge of Huttese. Little star. "What do you know of my son's perilous battles against Darth Vader?"_

 _Rey was drawn in to this surprisingly friendly man. "I…" she'd heard stories surrounding the name. That he was the second most powerful man in the galaxy. That he was an image of death itself as he killed countless innocents, including his own subjects of the Empire. That it took a then-fresh-faced Luke Skywalker, brimming with hope, to defeat him._

 _But that's not what she was expected to say. "Kylo Ren…he wants to be like him. You. What you...were."_

 _She sensed Luke trepidation at Anakin's next question. "Do you know anything about the man who became Darth Vader?"_

 _Rey felt breathless. She'd…heard stories about that too. Once long ago, a pilot with a criminal record had been hiding out in Niima Outpost, and Rey had been curious enough to listen to him. He was greyed and had been telling people he had a story that would make people believe in heaven and hell._

 _Rey had given into her childlike intuition and listened as the man regaled a tragic story of a kind and noble man, a former slave who had risen from the underbelly of the Outer Rim and became a Jedi. He became tormented with visions of the woman he loved, dying. The man was so desperate to save her that he ended up killing her. Consumed with self-loathing, the man hid his anguish to the galaxy, covered his weak form with black armor, and gave himself a new name._

 _The pilot had leaned in, his breath rank with knockback nectar, and said "He ruled the galaxy for almost a lifetime. 'Til his son, a warrior of the light like himself once, made him repent and held him through death."_

 _Rey looked at the son then, greyed and rueful in his silence. Then she turned back to this ghost-father whose easygoing nature belied a heavy past._

 _Anakin could tell she knew. "The Skywalker curse, I call it. Luke gets upset when I say it, but it's true. I fear that…I've wished many times before how if only a tall man hadn't taken me away from my home."_

 _Rey was quiet for a long time. She felt she'd stepped into a graveyard of sorrow and regret._

" _You can ask us more questions, if you want," Anakin finally said._

 _Rey had been trying to picture this blue-eyed youth in that damning suit of armor and helmet in pictures she had seen of Vader. She thought she could not put it together, but then she thought of how a nearly-innocent face emerged from Kylo Ren's helmet, and it made sense._

 _She remembered his fluent Huttese. "I heard that you were a slave."_

 _He grew quiet. It's something hardly anyone, even in the days of the Republic, knew about._

" _I've been a slave most of my life. Not really counting my time as a Jedi. My master was a pretty reasonable one. He never beat me, but there were times his disappointment in my training may as well have made bruises."_

 _Luke harrumphed._

 _Suddenly the spell was broken and the cursed father rose to his feet. "Let's continue this tomorrow, huh? How was the fish?"_

 _Rey had never eaten fish before. "Slimy."_

 _In the presence of desert-dwellers, Anakin Skywalker laughed. "You'll have worse, believe me. My son's a good cook, though, you have to admit."_

 _The glint of the pithy little fire caught Luke's metal hand. If it weren't for the distinctly metallic coloring, Rey would have mistaken it for a rotting, skeletal limb._

" _How did you get that?" she asked._

 _Luke looked supremely awkward. Not only did he look away from Anakin, but the ghost himself ducked his head shamefully as well._

" _I…had an accident – "_

" _I did that to him. When I was – " Anakin faltered. "The other guy. Him."_

 _Rey may not have talked, but her eyes betrayed the silence. Holy shit. That's…really fucked up._

 _Anakin was determined to wipe away the painful awkwardness. "I had one, too." He held up a gloved hand. "My whole arm, it got cut off by a Sith when I was a little younger than you."_

 _Rey shifted her gaze from father to son in suspicion. "So the two of you are planning to teach me how to use a lightsaber?" she asked in utter dubiousness. She only said this because of the way her mouth curved into a troublesome grin._

 _They balked, taken aback by the joke, and both began to laugh._

 _Luke was shaking his head like a helpless parent, but Anakin held no special airs as an adult. He practically cackled. "Oh, you – you're such a cute kid," Anakin said. "You're great!"_

 _Rey had gone to bed, still a little shaken over what she had gotten herself into, but more comforted at this new ghost who saw some kinship in her. He at least hadn't tried to push her away like Luke initially had. She hoped in the morning, Luke will give her a chance. She was so lonely. It would suck if she was forced to go home with no accomplishment._

 _That night, father and son talked about Rey's providential appearance. She listened in as best she can, but found herself quickly comforted by the bed of grass and the sweeping of the ocean into sleep._

ssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss

In the present, Rey is annoyed. "What are you doing here?"

This Force-ghost of Anakin is businesslike and brusque, not openly friendly right now. "I came to see how you were doing. I thought you could use some…comfort."

Rey stubbornly shakes her head and grits her teeth. "You're not the Skywalker I need. I already have _one_ Skywalker who's been...baptized in the dark trying to teach me new tricks." She jerks a finger where Ben Solo's supposed to be.

Anakin's sorrowful face contorts into something ugly. Rey snaps back as the ghost grabs her by the front of her shirt. Can he do that?!

"Listen, bantha shit," he mutters, thick with emotion. "I saw my son die. The one promise of redemption in the galaxy was murdered, and I couldn't do a thing. You think you feel helpless now, weak as a _chow-mai_ kitten and stuck on the sidelines? At least you have a life, still! I have to watch all of you make the same damn mistakes. So don't give me any crap about trying to help when you clearly need it."

He shoves Rey away from him like she's a rank mechanic's rag. Rey swallows and cricks her neck.

"So no one knows you're here? I don't get it," she says, quieter. "Your grandson's the one you should talk to, not me."

Anakin is quiet. "I can't. Ben's… he's not ready yet. To listen to me."

Rey will never understand what qualifies as "ready" to Jedi. Luke used to say it all the time. Maybe it means _they a_ re the ones who are not ready to help.

"Well, what about Leia? She's your daughter – "

"Haha, no. Nope. My daughter," Anakin interrupts sadly. "My daughter refuses to know me. She will never speak to me. I have hurt her too much."

Rey deflates. Well, so much for receiving help from an old ghost.

"Is Luke ok? Is he, like…allowed to be like you?" She means being a Force-ghost.

Anakin shakes his head. "That's going to take some time."

"Oh, well, that's great." She juts out her chin. "Are you here to do a better job at teaching me to stay away from the Dark Side?"

But Anakin shakes his head and casts a weary look at her. "It's already tainted you, hasn't it?"

Rey freezes. What makes him think….no. She does not react. She _will not_.

Anakin dives in effortlessly where his grandson Ben does not. "Your dream. The vision Snoke gave you. You fear dying. You fear the dark. You fear losing your friends and being all alone again. They're all choking you at once and you can't breathe. But you also have begun to fear the power in your veins. You think you're dangerous, and you don't even use the Force around them. That pile of bodies in your dream, the one where there's someone standing at the top. You don't look at the person up there because you know it's _you_."

All the breath leaves her body. Suddenly she is small. Her puffed-out pride and self-righteousness escape her. The scared girl, clinging to a metal stick as a monstrous desert storm rages overhead, is back. "Snoke… he's calling to me? In my sleep?"

Anakin nods. "He knew the moment Kylo Ren reported you to him, that you're powerful in the Force. You may think it's cute when you kick Ben to the ground, but you're stronger than him."

Rey's worst fear is brought to the surface. "How can this happen? I'm…I'm a good person."

"So was I!" Before Rey can understand him, the fallen Jedi's face is stripped down to haunted pain. "Sixty years ago I saved people's lives, I had a great friend, I...I was in love with my wife, and I was going to be a father. And it all got taken away from me because… _I_ chased it away." Anakin's eyes burn with the need to be understood, pleading. "My…my kids. One refuses to call me by my own name, instead calls me _that_ name – the _other_ name. And Luke…"

The ghost has to turn and walk away, hands clenching like talons. He shakes his head. "The Dark is patient, and lulling, and just as warm as the light. It's like falling into sleep. You don't even know you've slipped under until it's too late."

Rey feels she's been punched in the gut. It cannot be.

"This – " he gestures out to Ben, down below. "Rey, this is not just about you helping him. He knows what he's done, and he fights it every night. He is covered in his sins and he hides his battles because he's trying to repent on his own. It's remarkable he hasn't _killed_ himself. I know I would have if I hadn't died in my boy's arms. But that – that mess could be you. If you're not careful."

Rey is shaking. She doesn't know what to say.

"You're…you're both so precious to us. To me," Anakin says, his hands on her shoulders. "Please don't fall. Don't break my heart."


	16. Chapter 16

I Need a Teacher

By TheOneAndOnlySlayer

Chapter 16 (updated 9-22-2016)

Ben senses something, a stray wavelength up at the crest where Rey retreated to.

She's not indisposed. He paces one more time and ignores the former Stormtrooper's watchful eye.

"Hey, she just said she needed to –"

"Someone's with her," he responds flatly.

Mildly alert, Finn follows Ben up the incline. They find Rey walking in circles. She is restless and _talking_ to herself.

Her hands are around her stomach. "No. It's too much," she is muttering. "I _can't_. I'm not."

Finn is alarmed. "Rey? What's going on?" He goes over to her, touches her face like they are family, or lovers. Ben feels a mild prickling behind the ears as he notices how the Jedi leans into him.

"What's wrong with her?" Finn asks.

Ben knows. She's spiraled so quickly. This is so far from the unbeatable spirit he had faced a few moments ago, the one whose anger fueled her familiar energy. It's vanished, leaving this half-drained, half-mad woman he doesn't recognize.

And yet, there is a heavy shadow settling about her that he fights the instinct to run away from.

Before Ben can think of a way to do something, Rey puts her arms around Finn. The young man responds easily, enveloping her in a hug that Ben can tell warms her.

He watches like stone as the fragile Jedi chokes up some reassurance. "Oh. Sorry. I'm…it's so much. I just feel…tired," she lies.

Finn's had enough. "Okay, you know what? You need to eat. You, too," he says to Ben. "We're seriously taking a break, okay?"

Finn leads his friend back to the beach with the promise of sharing his fish dinner. Before she goes to follow him, Ben fixes his eyes on her, forcing the woman to look back at him. But Rey is too weighed with remorse to face him.

Ssssssssssssssssssssssssssss

Their training session has ended for the day. As night falls, the dozen Resistance members are scattered outside the castle. The night is strangely warm. Kivi, a junior technician and Rey are exchanging wrestling moves. Ben sits right above them to stare pointlessly at the dark horizon and the tide.

He's interested to see the former Stormtrooper approach him, all on his own.

Oh. They're beginning to think he's _harmless_ now. A declawed beast in a zoo, that's how he feels. He muses if Leia had said anything to them, but then heavily doubts it. She hasn't been around to see him. Hmph. So at least someone thinks he's still dangerous.

He flexes his jaw in distaste. That was wrong. He can't say those things anymore.

The boy's tone – businesslike but still so annoyingly youthful – breaks in. "How's she doing?"

"What is it you want?" Ben Solo interrupts.

Finn blinks. "I was just trying to make conversation."

"With your former…boss?" he ventures.

"With my best friend's...teacher, or whatever," he reasons.

Ben watches Kivi demonstrate a tumble and the technique to pin someone down. If Kylo Ren had known he would be sitting down and sharing a civil conversation with the Resistance, with the traitor from Jakku, he would have torn down the suggestion. He sometimes still feels confused on their relationship now; he has sliced the young man's spine a year ago; but he can't deny they both deserve to share the connection as First Order defectors.

He's thought about Rey's progress all day, but one thing is clear. "She is terrified."

Finn is quiet for a while. Isn't he usually a nervous talker? "Because she's afraid of falling to the Dark Side?"

Surprised at the correct perception, Ben faces Finn.

"Last night I never would have believed it. Rey's chided your - " Finn corrects himself in time before saying 'mother.' " - the General for throwing away the spare crust of a pie once. She's cried at a song we heard in a holovid show. I don't think she's ever been kissed. She's gotten teased more than me about how she's like an innocent kid. What does Snoke possibly see in her?"

Ben blinks at the naivete of this boy. He needs to crush it immediately. "If innocence could truly prevent those from falling to hatred and violence, then I would not have turned as a teenager." He waits for the message to sink in. "It's power. Snoke saw power in me. Not just my abilities in the Force, but my name. Another fallen Skywalker." Ben sniffs, musing. "He should have considered turning my mother. She's lost her adoptive family, her whole planet…she was tortured by her own birth father. Her son murdered the only man she loved." Ben glances at Finn. "Leia Organa's grief is as immeasurable and as deep as the ocean. Turning that into rage would be like kindling. Plus she's handled power with more grace than any First Order General I know."

He realizes he should not try to _scare_ Finn. He's not spoken this openly before, not with Rey. "Snoke knows he has lost me. He knew it since…since I first captured her on Takodana. He saw I became drawn to the Light again," he thinks of Rey's stubborn jaw and flashing eyes like it were a sweeter memory, "and he knew it was only a matter of time until I left him.

"Do you know what made my grandfather become Darth Vader?" Ben demands. "Anakin Skywalker was a man, just like you. Like me, like Rey. He was strong, kind, and good. He was loved. The Force emanated from him like energy from a star. He was the brightest star in the Jedi Order. What made him a target for the Dark Side was his weakness to love."

Finn frowns. "How can love be a weakness?"

"If a blaster was pointed to Rey's head, and you had to choose between her and a building full of hundreds of people – women and children – who would you choose?" Ben shot back in a flat tone.

Finn actually looks hurt at the directness of the question, but sighs in regret, conceding.

"Anakin Skywalker…all it took was doubt. Doubt in himself, in others. It wasn't anger or aggression, either, it was fear. Rey is…she treads it like water. She's survived on Jakku because of her fear, but she doubts herself as a Jedi."

They're both quiet for a while. They've both ignored these thoughts; it's not exactly a revelation because it's hung in the back of their heads. Finn thinks of how Rey seldom feels comfortable talking about her Jedi power, much less showing it. Ben thinks of how, as he learned this morning, in every single of their encounters after Starkiller Base, she's fought him with her lightsaber without the intention to kill him. Really kill him, despite what they talked about yesterday.

It's unexpected, this transition of their worst fear; not that Rey could die the next time she faces Snoke, but that she could turn to the Dark Side and be lost forever.

Because he feels he has been pushed enough lately, Ben looks for a change to unnerve the former underling. "How's your back?"

Finn almost gapes. He schools his features quickly. What a fucking awkward thing to ask, like it was the weather. "Oh. Um. It healed all right. I was unconscious for about a week, but…yeah, it's working fine." He says the last part with forced nonchalance. Internally Finn rattles at his response. He almost became paralyzed for life. This man almost killed him. This man...

Ben keeps his composure, but he's shifting just by a hairline. "If you're looking for an apology." He doesn't elaborate.

Frozen at this strange, placid creature, Finn is nearly speechless. "Doesn't matter at this point." But maybe it does.

And that is exactly what Ben says, as if plucked from Finn's whirling brain. "May I see it?"

Well, he wasn't expecting that. Especially in that softer tone of his. At this point Finn doesn't trust himself to speak. He hesitates before removing his jacket and hoisting the back of his shirt. What will Rey think? And why does he care what Rey thinks?

He expects former Kylo Ren's intense obsession over details will make him lean very, very close and ghost his fingertips over his skin and the metal prosthetic ridged in the middle of his back. He holds his breath and pretends it's okay, having his back to this once-volatile individual.

Finn's surprisingly…eager to prove him he isn't wary. Much.

He hears over his shoulder, "I am sorry for this."

This has no effect on Finn. He hopes it doesn't with Rey. Resolute, he turns around and pulls his shirt down. "It's not me you should worry about. It's everyone else you've threatened or killed."

In Finn's head, and in Ben's, the words _Hosnian system, Jedi_ , _Rey_ and _Han Solo_ echo like the waves.

Ben wears a determined mask of impassivity. "That is easy for you to say, _FN-2187_ – "

"It is, actually, because I never had to kill for the First Order. Not even when we both landed on Jakku. What about the other Stormtroopers who are trained to kill and end up like fodder in every Resistance attack? I want this war to end as much as anyone else because people keep dying. No matter what side."

Always an expert in getting the last word in (he had to, with a ponce like Hux), Ben says, "That depends on our success."

"Well, you better start thinking of better lesson plans," Finn advises, and Ben Solo is, loath as he is to admit it, _pissed_ at the dark young man. He purses his lips to an impenetrable frown, and descends into meditation.

Ssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss

That night Rey does not sleep at all.

She tried to, she really did. But with this intense worry for Poe, Jess, Snap and the others, and with allowing Ben into her head, and seeing Anakin (who's not here now, thank Force), her mind is electrocuted. It's manifested into a headache, and the only thing that seems to ease her is to latch onto the rhythm of the crashing waves.

She sits in the sand with only a lamp, kept as dim as possible, and keeps her chin on her knees.

People her age (which is what, 20?) are normally prone to outbursts and fits of confusion. After being in war, and being a member of a non-relatable, super-exclusive-it's-almost-extinct group of people like the Jedi, she's surprised she hasn't pulled her hair out and cursed at the sky at the top of her lungs.

She's angry, but she's trying not to be, yet it's simmered in her heart the whole afternoon. She's confused, and lonely. They all tell her she doesn't have to be lonely anymore, she's not on Jakku anymore and she has friends who support her no matter what. But they can't help her, not now. She'll lose them if she tells them what's going on in her head.

She wishes she never met the traitor to the Jedi, Kylo Ren. She wishes he had died somehow, not by her own hand, because she knows she would be buried in the guilt, even though he's kidnapped her, killed people, and murdered his own father. She wishes she had never met him because the two of them are intertwined together like day and night. Even if they weren't the only trained Jedi in the galaxy, it would be this way, dancing amongst each other like their duels, until the last bead of sweat.

She regrets not ever being good enough for Luke. She looks in on herself and wishes she hadn't felt so much disgust sink in, when Luke had found her undeserving for a Jedi. She had tried so hard. She wishes Luke hadn't retreated after Ben snapped and slaughtered all those Jedi, even though she feels so, so bad for him, the poor man who tried to rebuild his heritage, only to have lost so, so much all over again.

She feels betrayal at Leia, the woman who first embraced Rey and made the younger woman actually believe what a mother's touch could feel like. She understands, now, how far a woman will go to protect her own blood. It hurts even more how in retrospect, her own blood left her to be buried and picked at with the machines on Jakku, while a woman as kind and strong as Leia could challenge the galaxy to take her own villainous son away from her.

She is grasping at the will to understand her role in the universe. This war may never end. Is she expected to fight it, day in and day out, until she dies?

Fuck. Why even leave Jakku at all, if this is all….

Rey ducks her head into her knees, massaging the aching flesh around her neck and shoulders. The swelling in her neck has gone down, but it's a reminder of how…stupid she was that evening.

The Dark Side. Really? Her? Well…

She does not start at the sound of the lightsaber hitting the sand. It's because it's Ben, who won't harm her. She knows it. She's known it for… a while. Yet she's clung to her hatred for Kylo Ren all over again today.

When she looks up, she sees his towering form and pensive gaze.

"Let's try again," he says. "I can use... the other one."

Rey looks back at the saber hilt he tossed at her feet. It's Luke's.

She smiles a little. Oh, he doesn't know. He hasn't seen it yet, has he? She had been making her own for some time, a stubborn gesture towards Luke for thinking she wouldn't make a good Jedi, or maybe it was just he didn't have it in him to train a new warrior again. Either way, Anakin had planted the idea in her head, and Rey had been working on her own lightsaber for a few months.

Anakin had told her once about a Sith Lord, the first he had ever seen when he was just a boy. The man was a Zabrak, a terrifying alien made from nightmares, horns, blazing eyes and facial stripes. But the most fascinating thing about him was his unique fighting style, prompted by the double-bladed lightsaber that Rey's quarterstaff reminded him of.

"It would be a fine thing to see Snoke and those dingbat Knights of Ren see you've mastered a form they'd admire," he had joked when he told her.

Oh, and Rey had fashioned it so that the blade could unscrew into two separate but fully-functioning sabers. It was priceless to see Luke's face when she ignited both of them.

She takes Luke's old sword and tosses it back to Ben, unable to hold back her newfound merriment.

"How 'bout on the rocks? Uneven ground, and all that," she suggests. She waits for Ben to look back at Luke's hilt in his hands before taking out her own saber in her pack. She ignites both ends, drinking in the sight of his continually impassive face widen for once in shock.

It doesn't last. "About time you've found a way to make up for your short height," he drawls teasingly.


	17. Chapter 17

I need a Teacher

By TheOneAndOnlySlayer

Chapter 17 - Complete

Against the indigo night, two blades of the purest light sink into their hilts in a powerful hushing sound. The two warriors, one tall and commanding, and the other slight like a dagger, collapse on the rocks, both seeking flat surfaces to catch their fervent breaths.

"Wow! That was fantastic," Rey exclaims with a laugh, gleefully exerted.

The taller man cannot hold back a sly grin. "Next time, try not to hit me in the ass again," Ben scolds her in mild amusement. He pulls himself up and stumbles to where he left a canvas bag of water. Ben feels his blood rush through his body like four-legged gualaars galloping through his veins. He feels incredibly light, despite the quivering sensation in his arms and legs.

Rey turns her head at him, watching his long, angular neck bob as he guzzles down the water. His nostrils are flared as he breathes heavily through them, like an animal. He's tossed his sweat-slicked hair back in a purely casual manner, nothing to do with clearing his vision for combat purposes like she's seen him do a dozen times.

Then he does something Rey had been dreading, though she swears she would not have expected it. He pulls off his ratty shirt and dips it in the shore.

The moon arrived late, and it bounces along the man's outline. Rey isn't sure what she's thinking, only that she doesn't like when men take their shirts off. It's horribly impractical, even though she has to remind herself these are not people from Jakku who would have wasted their water content through sweat in the middle of the day.

The coast and the beach look serene, but with her aloof sparring partner casually draping his long form over that damn rock, she's suddenly conscious of her own appearance. Her hair hangs dreadfully in a drooping knot. Her shirt's gross and pit sweat-stained, especially after having been washed in seawater, dried out except for the salt. She's got an even rattier breastband underneath; she's sweating like a luggabeast but she'd be damned if she takes her shirt off.

It's not fair because master muscle-y over here gets to take _his_ shirt off. She's known the degree of his strength in every fight, but with his arms, chest and back exposed, she can see, really see the power flexing in his long arms. She's bucked under him a few times, but she's blamed it on the slippery rocks.

He's just so goddamned _good_ at fighting. Since their first lightsaber duel, Ben's/Kylo's skill has ranged from complacent parrying of her determined attacks to an eruption of movement. He's so fluid now, and even on the rocks he's bloody graceful. Rey's mildly annoyed and admiring of it.

Still. As big an opponent as he is, she loves fighting him.

And. Well. Hmm…Rey supposes, now that he's not the enemy anymore, she can think it openly in her head. He may be older than her, but she can detect the youthfulness in him, in his mouth when it's not curled in a terrible sneer, and in his shoulders, broad but in a casually noble stance.

She was once asked to imagine the Ben Solo the Skywalker-Solo family lost, if he were the man he should be now: kind, accomplished, strong and graceful, a leading generation of Jedi Knight. Would Rey have been his Padawan? Luke would have retired, probably to become more wrinkly and unintelligible like Master Yoda. In the cool nighttime, as they catch their breath, she can see a glimmer of it. She can approve of it.

His face has always been strange but attractive to look at. By attractive, Rey means she can't stop looking at it, because she's puzzled and wants to memorize every facet to make more sense of it. The slash she'd given him a year ago has faded to a silvered scar, just noticeable, but she can never ignore it on his face. Plus he carries himself so proudly, the way any aloof son of a princess would. No longer (too) spiteful of his parentage, she can try to pinpoint whose features are whose. It's a very indistinguishable combination of Leia's dark eyes, penetrating and assertive, and Han Solo's expressive mouth that is practiced to smirk. The slouch of his eyebrows is the smuggler's too, as is the nose.

It really, really, really sucks that Han's dead. She wonders…did Kylo Ren wear the mask to avoid seeing his father all the time?

The question is out of her mouth before she can rein it in. "When did you begin to turn?"

Ben Solo glances at her from underneath a stray lock of hair. Rey fears for a second he'll ignite his lightsaber again, but he chuckles softly to himself. "You have a gift for ruining the moment."

Rey turns away. "Sorry. Just…I know how important the mental exercises are, but I just feel that…it's not fair how you're learning so much about me." Seeing herself dancing, laughing, crying, basically as exposed as a physical nudity could evoke. "And I can't really…"

There's a small note of fear in his eyes when he shakes his head. In an instant the features that tempt the moonlight harden like this new facial mask he's adapted on this planet.

"I won't relive what I've done. Not even to you."

"No, not – not that stuff. I mean…" she sighs heavily, cursing her clumsiness. "I don't know if…I mean with that stuff, if you ever, want to…talk. About it."

Rey is the one who shivers saying it, yet Ben is so still, waiting on her every word. He's holding his breath.

"I guess since I'm the only person left alive who gets you," Rey surmises timidly. "As far as Jedi go."

" _Gets_ me?"

"Well. Yeah. I mean. Luke kept telling me…" And here Rey fidgets under the stars, feeling as if one of them is her old reluctant master's ghost. She thinks of the disgust, the burning in her guts that became caustic like a poison. All because she was jealous of his mother's love. "It could happen to me."

Across from her, Ben stiffens. His eyes are hooded as he watches the water lap beneath the rocks. "No, it couldn't."

"I killed when I was nine years old," Rey reminds him quietly.

"And I probably killed nine younglings who were that age when I was a teenager." His softer, brooding tone drops into something more resolute. It's not very cutting, like Kylo Ren if he was very, very calm. It's stated as a fact that won't go away. "Is that what you want to hear?"

Rey sinks, watching his slumped shoulders and thinned mouth. He's tightened his composure. She regrets opening _her_ stupid mouth. That's what she gets for hanging out with the likes of Kivi and Finn. She's beginning to feel she's lost some opportunity that would be precious to her, long after they've left this secret world, if they ever do.

Ben sighs. "I understand…what you are offering. I thank you. But it's not what I want. Not at this moment."

"Still." Rey's voice bounces calmly in the still air. "Tell me something…about before. Anything. Your childhood." She's heard very, very few pieces from Leia, and even then the General was extremely selective in what she chose to reveal to her damned son's enemy who wanted to destroy him. Rey isn't sure why she's asking Ben about his pre-Kylo days now. She doesn't even know what she's offering in that moment, how this will begin to change things between them.

He doesn't hear the twinge of curiosity in her voice, only the echo of what he's left behind; what he's torn down. "My childhood is not something worth admiring,"

"He says to the girl who was left to the desert to die," Rey finishes in mild humor. She shrugs. "My best friend was conditioned to think like an adult as a toddler, and we've both gotten tired of listening to Poe Dameron go on about his _perfect_ pilot parents. Go on, tell me about how much of a pain in the arse Leia is. I won't tell."

Her eyes slide over to him like the two of them have been schoolmates for years, and are just starting to break the ice in between. But they have fought and maimed each other before. She's left enough scars on him that outnumbers the ones he's recently inflicted. Thankfully she hasn't noticed the ones on his sides and arms…or maybe she's too timid to ask about them.

Ben weighs in his options, watching her impassive face stare back into the sky. He does the same by leaning back and facing the stars. He thinks of training with Luke. _No_ , he thinks, reminded of his their earlier training sessions. _Go deeper._

"I wasn't allowed on the _Falcon_ as a child." He paused at Rey's grunt of disapproval. "Not until I snuck on it when I was four. Father and Chewie were halfway on their way to Bespin when they encountered some trouble, and one of them did some barrel roll and I got pinned under one of the ventilation posts."

He hid his smile at the sound of her bubbling chuckle. Pleased, suddenly, at the sound, he continued. "I was so scared. Not for me, they wouldn't yell at me. But my mother was going to incinerate him with her eyes, maybe even starve him like a dog and lock him out of the house for a whole week. I didn't even cry until Chewie found me a day later. I looked like a stray animal caught by some public officer. I didn't care if they thought I was traumatized, all I could think of was that I had to piss so bad!"

By the end of his story his stomach is quivering and his mouth is extended into an honest grin. He looks over and sees Rey with a hand over her eyes in disbelief at the imagery, another holding her stomach together. Her laughter susurrates like reeds in the wind.

"You poor – " Rey begins, then changes it. "You _dope_." The way she condemns him with that exaggerated Coruscanti accent of hers makes him dive into some secret crevice with that tone, to preserve that sound in a box of some kind. Her teeth glow brighter than the moonlight. He never thought a smile could take over someone's face like hers.

"Another?" he asks.

"Come on; I want gangly, pubescent Ben."

He scoffs. "Fuck off. That's private."

"Did you happen to hit six feet when you were twelve and just grow your hair after that?" she teases.

Ben scowls. "I'm so happy my parents never decided on a little brother or sister. The longer this conversation will go…"

Rey half-harrumphs, half-giggles. "Oh, yeah, that's exactly what you would have needed. A little Solo princess to tie your sorry arse down."

The comment drifts between them thoughtfully, perhaps a little awkwardly…Ben certainly has thought on this before. He remembers asking his parents as a child why he couldn't have a little sister or brother to push around and look after – at the time he remembered voicing this to his mother, his parents' periods of separation had become more frequent, leaving Ben with his mother, who'd left him at home or in some political capital office. If he had had a younger sibling, who knows what may have happened to him.

He glances at his silent Jedi, equally pensive and trying not to stare at him. He – Kylo Ren – used to tease her mercilessly about her lonely life on Jakku. He'd called her pathetic, worthless, loveless. Where was her family?

He finds himself wanting to explain something to her. "My mother had wanted a girl. When she was first pregnant with me." The words come out as frail, he speaks of them in the most gentle undertone.

Rey does not mind. In fact she scoffs in jest. "Princess. Learning how to curtsy and wear the blummin' family jewels."

He thinks of his mother now, upstairs in that damp stone shelter with its caved-in roof and endless cold even on a soothing night like this. He hadn't seen her, before he soared into the freighter and escaped Snoke with Rey in his arms, since before he was a teenager. Her face had been ripped in grief for her brother then. He could barely…if he hadn't thought of Rey, and needed so badly to help her, he doesn't know now if he would have had the courage to go to her. Comfort her…

She must be tired and frail now, albeit stubborn as a Wookie. The Skywalker power is more impressive in that hardened, middle-aged woman than in the son she bore and raised.

"She loves you," Ben says to Rey. It's true – he's sensed it. As Kylo he had never, ever been able to shake his bond with his Force-sensitive parent, even if he had forcibly dimmed it to a bond of emotional sensations; nothing more tangible than that. He's felt the warmth like a second candle being shared in new light, the way Leia had taken to Rey and kept her under her wing like an adopted daughter. He can safely feel it now with no degree of revulsion as Kylo. He is content to know…his mother was taken care of. Even if Rey was the one actually being cared for.

"I'm glad to know she had you to care for….and that you have cared for her, too." he adds, letting the comment be taken as a true compliment.

Rey is startled to hear this. It's the nicest anyone has ever said about her relationship with the high and mighty, cantankerous, grumbling, bossy general-princess. She's been teased when Jess once fixed her hair into a braid if the General had done it, maybe even brushed her hair and tucked her in bed with a bedtime story. They all praised the woman like she was some saint with light bloomin' out of her arse, but no one's made a genuinely nice comment (acknowledgement, really) about Rey's closeness with the Resistance leader.

And now Ben Solo is telling her he's grateful to her, for looking out for his mother. It isn't even appropriate for Rey to say something like "you should've been here to do that yourself." Rey's been given, semi-officially, the ship that Ben grew up on; waddled around when he was learning to walk, perhaps. Her "first mate" is the uncle who held him as a babe. Her teacher's his uncle and former mentor. Her "boss" is Ben's mother. She's literally taken the spot he vacated, and made the Skywalkers her own family. She didn't even do much taking, either; they all just came to her like a missing inheritance.

Unexpectedly, she feels very sad. She's felt sad, for the others, before, but looking at the fallen Jedi now, she comprehends the way he's extended this small, silly peace offering as something more, something that's impossible to intellect any further.

"Thanks," she says finally. Awkwardly; because she wants him to know she appreciates it, but…oh.

There's still so much between them. It can't be as easy as making some kind of truce. What's going to happen to them when the war's over? When she finally fights Snoke and (if she actually believes in this training) kills him? What will happen to Ben?

His face isn't illuminated from the moon in this angle very well, but she feels his eyes on her, measuring her. It's not creepy at all – not this time. Until -

He sits up suddenly and leans forward. He's only a few feet away. "How did you know?"

Rey waits. "Know what?"

His space-black eyes (she knows they're brown, but they've always appeared felt black as night) fix on her even more. "How did you know that I would…"

It hangs alone, daring to be pieced together: _how did Rey know that Ben would return, to be redeemed? That he would come back to the Light?_

He does not speak softly like a scared boy who has been punished. He speaks like a man who has avoided a death sentence, and doesn't feel as brave as he is to want to know why.

Rey feels suddenly so small and cold under the night sky, and wants the sea to carry her away. As a reflex she closes her mind from his inspection, even though he wouldn't betray her.

She can't answer this. She'd need some wine and maybe Luke Skywalker's oddball interpretive skills to fool Ben Solo. She knows his determination; it's as precise as a hunter's. She can't give him some half-assed explanation like she did with Finn and Leia, even Luke.

She gets up, making sure to meet his expectant glare. "It's…late. Um. I don't want to be tired for my next lesson."

She leaves him and his radioactive stare at her retreating form, knowing he will take it as a rejection of sorts and obsess over her hesitance all night. He will try to pry it from her tomorrow, in a worse mood than the night before. She's being a coward. But he _cannot_ know why…

She walks up the beach and into the icebox of a castle and its crumbling stairs. She has to maneuver Finn off the blankets so she can safely bundle under them. As she lies down and prepares herself for tomorrow, she prays she will go to sleep without dreaming. She knows there is one in particular that she cannot let control her. _He can't know_ , she thinks. _It's not…it's not right._

 _He won't believe it…._


	18. Chapter 18

I Need a Teacher

By TheOneAndOnlySlayer

Chapter 18 complete (updated 9-22-2016)

The moment Ben had asked Rey the question, about how she first believed he was capable to relinquishing the Dark, he strongly suspected she would not want to answer.

He thought she would at least try to. Her earnest nature often gets the better of her. She just offered to play therapist with him – a most dangerous proposition for anyone's mental health.

In all this newfound purpose on their lost planet, this secret home of theirs, Ben feels like he is growing weaker every day. He may appraise his temporary student for helping her redraw her power, but all alone like this – in his head, in the way his only interactions are with her – he feels he is losing direction, the stars are dimming. The facets of his control – the only thing he will not be stripped away of – are deepening.

There is a fresh cut on his leg, running down his thigh. It stings the most after he had to sacrifice his footing with Rey's sparring, and he stumbled into the shallow seawater.

He turns away from the ocean, restless now and needing to distract himself.

As he returns to the castle, choosing a less crowded entrance to his cell, a familiar sensation returns. He shakes his head, feeling the ache in unexpected speed. It's not just in his head; it crawls deep into his soul with fluid determination.

 _Kylo_.

Gritting his teeth, Ben Solo – _Ben. Ben Solo_ – the Jedi, the youngest Skywalker, swears, "You are _not_ _here_."

He breathes like he has seen a ghost, like he is on the run. He's being hunted, but there is nowhere to hide.

Stumbling into his shelter, he sinks into meditation and imagines that the shadowy frame of Kylo Ren cannot enter. Neither can Snoke; his _master_ -

 _You're not my master anymore. You are a monster. You corrupt children. You corrupted me. You ruined me._

It's not really known how Ben, who has never said these things to his former master in person, gets the strength to address these truths. It is the first time he really thinks he believes it. If Snoke were really here, Ben would feel the righteousness surge in him like fire to a forest.

But the smoke-curling voice, whether it's Snoke's or Kylo's mechanical one, thrusts in: _I just showed you the way. You were always damned. You were always meant to kill, to destroy. To rule._

Before Ben can hastily rebuild his mental defenses, he is struck with an image. It is poorly-constructed, like a painting that is struggling to be finished within minutes. Colors are being shaded in, namely dark blood and the pale of death.

The knight's eyes widen. It is a cheap, predictable shot, but it no doubt does the trick: it's Rey. She's on the ground, not like last time. She's cleaved in two. It's not clean – there are no cauterized lightsaber wounds, and there is so, so much blood.

Ben is physically undone. He jerks away as if struck, left reeling. No! No, not Rey. Not her. He can't – he needs her.

 _Foolish man-child you are_ , the voice grumbles. _Always clinging to those more powerful than you. She hates you. HATES YOU!_

And then the scene changes to Rey standing, emotions roaring from her like a deafening waterfall.

"You had EVERYTHING!" she exclaims. Ben withers. This is from a real fight from months ago, their second one. She and Luke had challenged him together, and as usual Rey remained standing. In the past, she had sounded sad, pitying, trying to understand, but this jagged, sharp image-Rey is bleeding with rage. "You had a family and people who loved you and a childhood, all the things I should've had! Why does everyone still cling to you after you've abandoned them? Why do they not give up on you, but _mine_ have?!"

And then the vision extends further, like water trickling from a puddle. Ben sees himself, a half-Kylo-half-Ben, kneeling at her feet and looking more subservient than he ever was with Snoke. He looks like he's happy to take a beating from her just to prove to his new – master, he realizes – the degree of his devotion.

 _Always changing masters whenever it suits you,_ the voice points out snidely. Ben cannot believe it – Snoke is projecting his own feelings. _You truly are weak. And you think you can do better by her. Her! She'll discard you. She'll never want you. You're too tainted from me. You're wasted goods. You're not worth her touch._

Well. Now _that_ hurt.

Ben is alone in this cell to withstand these demons. He grabs Uncle Luke's lightsaber and looks at it with newfound devotion.

"I will be," he dares to say. "I will be when I kill you. For her." _I'll do it for her._ And he believes it. It's a dip into the Dark Side, but it's worth the reaction he senses from the wretched being at Ben's brazenness.

Quickly he incinerates Snoke's connection and buries deep from his sight. He has preserved their location for now, but he's shaken: this is the most he has heard from his former master. He will come back, stronger. Even if none of the Resistance members know where they are, Snoke can.

He thinks of that vision of Rey as a child, ducked under the AT-AT in the howling desert storm, fearing the dark and wanting it to just be over. If it's over, it'll be over. She just had to wait the night.

He realizes he may need to focus on her downstairs, even though she may be pressed against the boy Stormtrooper as they sleep. He offered her a chance to some peaceful sleep last night. He needs to draw on her now, if only to have proof that she is indeed alive. Alive and unafraid of him.

Ben does not fear the dark. He knows exactly what's waiting there. Now, however, with the sound of her breathing (her laughter, he remembers) he will last the night.

ssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss

The first time Rey uncovered the possibility of Ben's redemption was in a dream.

It had started out as just an image, of Kylo-without-his-mask clutching Luke's lightsaber, the cursed family heirloom, like it was a key to his salvation. Rey hadn't been able to look away for two reasons: one, he had looked so calm, so quietly confused. The other reason was that she could feel no danger lurking within him. She had crept, as one could in dreams, closer, only to find the vision being swept away.

What…what happened after this one was more…well, let's just say a lot more happened in the other dream.

 _They began fighting, maybe on Takodana because of the damp, warm, clean forest. Only this time Rey was armed, Kylo unmasked and, almost inappropriately, exposing his emotions to Rey. The whiteness of his teeth and eyes were as wild as an animal's, and yet Rey, in the dream, was cool and expecting every thrust and parry. Even the heat of their lightsabers and the crinkled brown leaves under her feet were like real sensory details._

 _Kylo Ren faced her, clad in so much energy it was as if invisible chains tried to hold him back. His eyes simmered violently._

 _Rey had attacked him with no trace of hatred, not like the first time. She was fluid, focused, always in defense. She moved like water and air around him, light and calm. In contrast he whizzed about like fire, threatening to consume whatever space he invaded._

 _They continued for a while, but never too long; Rey repeatedly blocking his fiery rage and Kylo Ren losing control and becoming all the more unstable for it, until finally –_

 _Both have turned in perfect half-arcs with their lightsabers. Each blade lands within an inch of each other's necks. They both falter at how quickly they've halted. Their adrenaline makes them quiver just a little as they remain in a still standoff._

 _Though the cracked crystal lightsaber sizzles at Rey's neck, she is not afraid at all. Self-preservation does not exist in the basest part of her mind. Instead, there is pity, regret, and…the birth of something else. Hope._

" _I can't do it," she finally says. "This isn't you."_

" _This_ is _me," the man with two souls tells her. "And_ I will _kill you."_

" _No, you won't." Dream-Rey shakes her head. "You can't do it either. You never will."_

 _Distracted, Kylo moves with the slightest inflection, giving away his doubt._

 _Dream-Rey senses it and fills it with words Real-Rey will begin to fear. "You're attracted to me. You've missed me," she goes on. "And you_ love _me."_

 _The dark warrior clenches his teeth like a wounded animal. He doesn't surrender even though the Light is pouring into him. "Come on. Come on!" he growls out._

 _Enough of this. Dream-Rey disarms her lightsaber and swats his red blade away like it's nothing, like it's a twig. She invades his space, cups her hands to his face (doesn't matter that the man is as tall as a Wookie) and presses her mouth to his._

 _Kylo recoils, like he's been stung, but he doesn't have the mind to push her away. He can only stagger back helplessly as this woman controls him._

 _Real-Rey has shuddered, too, as if_ she _has felt the kiss as an invasion. She watches in mixed wonder and horror as her foe puts his unarmed hand to push Dream-Rey at the neck, his lightsaber still active and dragging. Real-Rey is convinced Kylo will smarten and take that lightsaber through Dream-Rey's midsection. But then –_ then _– he stops trying to lean away. He stops hesitating. He stills, his lips half-open and dragging against hers, and he – he tilts forward, suddenly curious and afraid to show that he, too, knew this would happen, and that all this time he has been hungry for it._

 _He lets out a shuddering breath. Real-Rey feels something change in her gut, in the center of her body she thinks has been dried out from Jakku's loneliness. She feels she is being joined with the Rey who is determinedly pressed against her sworn enemy._ He won't kiss her back _, they both think._ Why won't he kiss her _–_

" _This isn't possible," the man whispers; breath hot like sweetened spice against Rey's face. His eyes are closed, not daring to believe in any of it. His features are so soft and yearning that he looks beautiful._

" _Yes it is," Dream-Rey says. "You've felt it. You've known it. Because you are mine, and I am yours – "_

 _It doesn't seem to matter what Dream-Rey says because now Kylo begins to press his mouth against hers, and gloved hands cling to her back and her head, her jaw, her hair, her shoulder. Pressure so hot and roiling it feels like ore, builds up from that once-nonexistent place in Rey's abdomen, and flows like a river of life inside her. Like the first time she felt the word 'family' as something she had earned among her friends, and the first time she felt the Force, like a parent whose existence centered around her own…this, too, was meant to be._

 _His face. Oh gods, his face – it's so_ close _–_

A gasp tears away at Rey's lungs. She sits up in a flash, shaken and in a cold sweat.

 _Holy shit. Holy shit, did he sense that? I hope he didn't._

Why did she wake up? It can't be from that, damnit.

No, there's commotion. Someone's yelling downstairs, outside.

Finn's not next to her. She searches – and widens in shock. He's in pain, and disbelief.

"Jess."


	19. Chapter 19

I Need a Teacher

By TheOneAndOnlySlayer

Chapter 19

With every crippled step down to the lower level, Rey thinks of Jess Pava. She thinks of her fierce, gentle, confident friend because she senses the ugliness of Finn's thoughts, projected so greatly that Rey thinks he is seconds away from killing himself.

Jess's face, a little pinched around the eyes in a way Rey has never seen before in a humanoid, but otherwise youthful and attractive; a contrast from Snap Wexley's larger, older frame when Rey first met them after visiting Finn at the hospital.

Jess sharing her bunk with Rey so she could use the fresher for the first time. Offering literally anything in her room to Rey, who was more likely to covet than to share.

Jess's smile, warm as sunlight, her dark eyes brighter than stars.

The way the accomplished pilot handled athleticism, technical skill and her own shade of beauty all as one individual, like facets in a jewel. Rey learns, after returning from Ach-To with Luke, that even though she feels just a little bit threatened at the way Finn's eyes follow her, more devotedly than in the first few days he and Rey became friends, she comes to admit that she does, as well.

Jess is just…she's really cool. She's the first female friend Rey made who shares her own age. It's cute having Poe and Finn around like brothers, but Rey begins to feel…she knows she is a woman in her prime and ought to enjoy the gift and skill her sex offers; a kind of innate strength possessed by mothers, lovers and beautiful things. Rey feels starved for them all, foolish in her naiveté, like she's inherited a beautiful gown and has carried it all her life, and only now begins to understand that wearing it makes her capable of so many things.

Poe may be the captain of the fliers, but Jess Pava is the darling sister, the daughter, the one whose smile changes the movement of the air.

Whoever killed her made the wrong, severely wrong choice of turning her into a martyr.

Rey barrels down one floor and sets for the last flight down when a black-clad form descends – Ben looks like he's been chased by a ghost as well. Rey realizes in a split second he must have heard her, Finn, and everyone downstairs.

They don't say a word. Rey doesn't even think about blushing from the dream. She races down and they are met with stilted activity. A dozen half-stony, half-struck faces are bent over consoles or radio messages.

Leia stands over Kivi who is bent at the controls of their main transponder. The normally sarcastic prick is sober, frowning at the voice from the other end.

It's Poe's voice. "Command, this is Black Leader,." He sounds more detached than the machine's normal distortion. " _Dreadnought_ 's taken sixty of us hostage for questioning. First Order broadcast a, a message…"

There's silence that isn't attributed to the connection. Rey thinks he must be trying not to sob.

"They killed Jess, ma'am."

"No names via transmission, Black Leader!" Leia barks out. Her hand had been covering her mouth tightly before.

Rey dares to look at Finn, who buckles to the ground in slow motion. She moves past Ben (there is a narrow gap between him and some technician, that Rey has to brush against his robes, but she ignores the faint contact) and kneels, carefully, to her friend.

As soon as she does, the shock hits her, and she barely has any air in her lungs to cry. Her hand reaches out, heavy as lead. She wants to hold his, but Finn is flickering against the dark that closes in.

"They – ma'am, there's something…"

Leia exhales harshly. "How many others?"

The radio actually catches the intake of breath Poe makes. "No one. Just her. They…they recorded it." Poe's voice is strained with emotion. "I'm saying they _executed_ her."

A shiver falls upon the room. Execution. The First Order would have made a grand gesture, setting the young woman up for death like a ceremonial sacrifice, an example of retribution.

One Resistance woman among them dares to voice it. "H-How?"

Poe, whether he heard the woman or couldn't help himself, added, "They had her walk to some platform and…there was a man, with a lightsaber – "

Rey would not look at Ben behind her. Another Ren Knight did this.

All of a sudden, it occurs to Rey that this is the worst offense that could be brought down upon the First Order, personally. Rey should have known – they _all_ should have – that attacking Snoke head-on and managing to escape with one of their strongest allies…the second-in-command, if they're all being honest…would not go unpunished. Of course they would want to reply with as much of a loss, all the more impossible to stomach with such a violent, archaic message.

It tears at Rey so much that she feels hollow. The training to sooth her mind will not ground her. As she kneels next to Finn, she feels his grief, his rage, all working its way into an eruption.

Rey holds back a sob as Finn says, to her, "Did you know?"

It takes several seconds to understand him. She sensed nothing until a few minutes ago.

When she turns to face him, she wishes she hadn't. Finn's face is burning like a violent sun. His mouth is so stubbornly set that, if she weren't a Jedi, she'd recoil.

He gets up. She distantly stares at the dirt on his knees. "Did you? Did you see this coming?"

At this accusation, Rey turns and looks up at Ben, who wisely doesn't appear impenetrable at the morbid news.

When he says nothing, Finn's rage flares out, making Rey feel burned. "Did you KNOW?!"

She senses Ben's distaste at the aggression. "It wouldn't have made any difference."

Finn's face contorts into something ugly. He breathes hot fire and Rey clenches her hands to her mouth, whimpering. _Not Jess._

This is the price for their brashness. They cleaved the woman in two and left her corpse to stink. All because they wanted to reclaim their lost Skywalker heir.

Rey reaches out to Finn, fingers brushing against his leg. But the man walks away, outside…to the grounded ships.

No one thinks to stop him until Kivi says, "He's climbing to one of the X-wings!"

Rey pulls herself up from the dirt and races over to the craft. He's already started up the engines.

What does he think he's – "Finn! FINN!"

Desperate, she jumps up to the nose of the fighter and bangs her fist on the glass cockpit. If she can't stop him, even if Poe was here, she knows he will not come back. Finn is half-mad with intent, bullishly staring with a predator's laser-focus, forward, ignoring his friend.

"Finn, stop! You can't be doing this! Get out of there and talk to me! FINN, please!"

Hot tears stream down her face but Finn does not look at her. Instead he dares to project his emotions, and even his own memories, to the Jedi.

 _Sunlight streaming through – a smile so sweet and lovely it's like his eyes are drinking it in. Her dark hair falls gracefully in ringlets, each a carefully-spun tendril, even when she shakes it out of her helmet, every single damn time._

 _Finn is laughing and staring too much at her lips. Jess is leaning her head in her hand over the bar, thinking of Finn this whole time as a person, a man who has been found. She says she is attracted to him, and wants to show him just how much, "if that's okay with you."_

 _Clothes whisper off his skin, and her skin, too. Her hands and arms are cold, but, as she says against his ear, "They always are in space."_

 _And then they are holding hands under the table, all because Finn is so shy and doesn't want to endure everyone's teasing later in the night. And Jess understands. She gets it; she wants to protect him._

 _The way she looks out for him as the whole squad returns from a mission, and gives him a reassuring glare, and later comes to him, wraps her arms around his neck and breathes into it, too. "I'm okay," she says quietly. "I'm all right, Finn. I made it back, sweetheart."_

 _And then the last one. The last private moment between them, something he so carefully guarded even from Rey…they lie next to each other, an immeasurable amount of skin on skin. They talk about each other, about after the war._

 _Jess is not a woman who will relinquish her independence easily. She gently reminds Finn, but adds in with a conspiratorial wink, "I mean…we_ would _make very good-looking babies."_

 _Her laughter echoes in Finn's mind, erodes at his heart. She's dead. She's gone. Not even in a quick blink exploding into space like her comrades…a public show. She was scared, weeping. They gave her time to think about her death…_

Rey's fist hangs weakly, inches from the glass. She shudders as each memory changes, forced in front of her like ghastly photos.

She takes a deep, wailing breath. The entire fighter roars around her and she can't hear herself cry or think. "Please, Finn. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry! Don't go…"

 _Don't leave me._

Finn's stare lightens. In the blazing day his head tilts to his friend eclipsing the sun. There's the softness in his eyes, of a man who hears the ice breaking under him, and fears the searing cold.

Then he goes completely slack. Rey can feel Ben behind them.

"Shut it down!" Ben yells at Rey, arm outstretched.

Rey feels through the interior of the cockpit and mentally shuts off the engine. Shakily, she locates the switch the same way to unlock the glass dome. She thrusts a hand on his lolling neck, fingers shaking to unbuckle the straps.

"Rey. Rey, stop." Ben has climbed up the ladder and his voice is strange, urgent but gentle. "Rey – _stop_. Look at me."

She does. He…his eyes are blown, open and genuine. He's never looked this reassuring before, like he's channeling some steadiness into her. "It's all right. I've got him."

Just like that, the tight energy is sapped from her. She goes slack in the cockpit over her friend. Ben lurches in like the giant he is and hooks underneath Finn's arms to get him out. He shakes off Rey's clumsy attempt to help, muttering "Jump off the cockpit, Rey, I've got him" under his breath.

She realizes with gratitude that Ben could have carried him out using the Force, instead of holding his stocky form. As she follows him, trying to hold back her crying, out of some stupid form of dignity, Rey realizes he's trying to help. He knows, too…it's his fault, even if Finn will take back (eventually…) what he suggested; that he knew someone would pay for the First Order's losing one of its primary leaders.


	20. Chapter 20

I need a Teacher

By TheOneAndOnlySlayer

Chapter 20 complete (updated 9-23-2016)

Ben feels a little weird holding the former Stormtrooper in his arms. It's uncomfortably intimate, not at all like when he carried Rey to escape Snoke…or even the first day he found her.

She follows him dumbly up the stairs, where the two of them normally sleep. He waits for Rey to come around and rearrange the mixture of blankets so he can set the younger man down.

He can't help but watch how Rey puts her hands on her close friend's face, stroking his closely-shaven hair. He tries to make himself useful by untangling Finn's legs and tossing a thin sheet over him.

"I've subdued him so he can sleep. He'll be out of it through the night, I think."

Rey's bright eyes are wet but they do not blink. She gazes at the fallen man with such open devotion that it makes Ben's heart clench. Finally, she leans forward and stretches out her legs, pulling the sheet over herself, too.

Now Ben's presence in the room suddenly feels intrusive. He wants to speak up, to remind her that she cannot sink to this level of regret when there's so much work for them to do.

For two full days she was his, and now he feels cast off. "Will you be with him all day?"

Rey doesn't seem to hear him. She lays her small hand on his chest, presumably to check his heartbeat. He's so still. She didn't expect to see him go down so fast from Ben's sleep trick.

"Rey." Ben's voice is suddenly stern, reproachful. "We have too much to do, you can't waste it..."

His teacher voice falters when she looks up to him for the first time. She does not look up at him in anger or a condescending leer, but with a pleading look that makes him feel like a beast.

It's no use. He scowls, resigned at her grief and retreats, not sure where else to go.

Ssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss

Ben Solo practices. He meditates, he swings his new lightsaber and lunges about his spacious cell. He imagines, despite the smoky cloud of depression that has overtaken the ruined castle, Snoke's face being split in clean halves.

He never knew this young pilot woman who died, of course. Something itches within him as he thinks, he would have liked to. Perhaps he would have earned the right to be at Rey's side, even if she rests next to Finn like he's her sweetheart.

He growls out loud, whirling the blue lightsaber in his wrist. He shouldn't be so touched with emotion.

Was Rey jealous, perhaps? Of her closest friend having a woman he loved all his own? Among so many things, he doesn't see Rey following the Jedi code of chastity. He has always felt how starved and alienated over affection she's been, never immediately trusting someone's genuine act of kindness or friendship. Where a child-sized Ben Solo made this habit appear ironic and ridiculous, it made Rey appear truly sad and worth pitying.

Ben thinks of how the girl created a small but effective tremor in the ground with a stomp of her foot. It's an awfully neat trick. Not half as marvelous as pulling a damned TIE fighter out of the sky at full speed. If Ben wants to practice the former feat, he must calm his distracted mind.

Ssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss

Nightfall comes. Ben does not bother to join the others for supper. Deciding that fasting tonight would be best, he admits that he does not want to interfere with everyone's mourning.

An execution. A Ren knight would have had the honor. A beheading, perhaps. It's graphic and ugly, especially for a young woman. Maybe...maybe the image Snoke tormented him with of Rey severed at the midsection last night was meant to represent the doomed female pilot. If Ben were weaker, he'd vomit.

There is an echo coming from outside. Rising from the floor, Ben stares out to the beach. Rey is out there like last night, only her thoughts are louder than before. There's no lantern. She is alone in the dark.

Against physical possibility, the water surges. It collects and builds on top of itself somehow. As it arcs into a taller, rapidly towering wall, Ben gapes, awed at the power. She's doing it, and definitely not on purpose. Her emotions are like a storm, mindlessly desiring to rip apart anything close by.

Any loss of her concentration and she could be crushed, obliterated by the water.

He hurries out, all but terrified for her.

ssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss

Rey wants to die.

She can't do this anymore.

Why. _Why, Whyyyyy…_

She tried to peer through Finn's...not his mind, she didn't want to insult his privacy. Ben had placed him into such a deep sleep that, the further she dove to try and soothe her friend with her presence, the less sure she felt of her way.

Frightened fool. She couldn't help him. Jess was dead...and Rey...

She couldn't look at Finn's face anymore. She had failed him. He always had such immeasurable faith in her. Now her enemies had lashed out at the Jedi personally by cutting up Jess like an animal.

All her fault. Last night she had been staring up at the sky, thinking about herself and her _place in the universe._ Playing lightsaber battles with a man she is afraid of getting too close to. Trying not to think of his face when it calmed into kindness. Later still, in sleep, the way his lips pressed to hers.

She can't do this anymore. She wants to die. Someone come and destroy her, let them be satisfied and leave them all alone. Something please come and swallow her whole, remove her and make her not exist anymore...

"Rey."

Ben Solo finds her on the beach. The dark water shimmers in the moonlight but it stills them both in shadow.

Rey is beyond shattered to notice him. He's amazed he's ventured this far without this hundred-foot wave coming down on him. "Rey, look at me."

When she does, she looks so tormented he feels he's been struck. He feels the way she clings to breathing in choked gasps, and thinks he may be sick.

Ben shakes his head. " _Rey_ ," he sighs.

The grieving girl shakes her head, pawing at her chest and throat. "I can't. I can't do this. I - " her breath hitches, like steel blades hissing. "I can't breathe - !"

In two long strides he comes to her. He holds one arm out at the gigantic wave that could kill the both of them and lays the other one on her shoulder. "Focus on me. Feel how steady I am. Feel that?" he says with gentle urgency and wide eyes, needing her to get a grip. "You need to calm yourself or you could kill us both. _Focus_." Against his intentions his hand slides up to her jaw and clasps her face so he can stare her down.

His instructions seem to snap something out of her, and as she closes her eyes Ben can sense she is trying to smooth out the wrinkles and jagged edges she let flood around her.

"Deep breaths. Let it fall from you. Don't - " he pauses as Rey shudders, sobbing. "Don't let it control you," he pleads.

Finally, majestically, the water calms and returns to its normal sea level. The moon makes everything glow softly again. Ben looks out to the water, letting his hand drop as the other wraps around the Jedi.

He doesn't know why he's done it or how, bringing her so close to himself. He can't remember the last time he's touched someone outside of malice before. It's the right thing to do, isn't it? It's...her head is under his chin. She's practically blind and exhausted in her tormented sorrow that she must have no idea just how close she is to her former enemy. Or what exactly what it's doing to him.

It's wrong, he finally concludes, how Ben could feel something emerge as a gift from a place that has left the woman so bereft, so torn.

Ben must let himself share her grief. He takes it and lets it weigh him down. The two of them sit in the sand, unable to talk.

She's openly crying against his chest, his neck. This should repulse him. It has before. Now, he can only hold her tighter, draw his cloak around her and whisper against her hair that he is sorry.

A long time passes before Rey can speak coherently. Mostly it's just "Oh - !" "Not Jess" and "How can they…?" Ben can't answer these things and concentrates on…an appropriate distance even as he strokes her back and hair.

She's so frail, her ribcage expanding against his side like a small animal's. Her breath fans like a fever against his collarbone. Ben projects a sense of calm around him for the girl to tether herself to.

When she…when she flexes her fists into his outer robes, his breath hitches in surprise. In that moment he realizes he must look very awkward, sitting on the beach with his annoyingly long legs sprawled out, not at all looking dignified with this woman clinging to him.

He feels he can remain this way forever.

He won't look down to see her face. He senses from her guilt that she needs a little privacy. A smaller part whispers he doesn't want her to turn on this moment and see him as a monster.

"Rey," he says, having counted a hundred stars beforehand. "Tell me."

This almost threatens to make the woman weep all over again, but she holds fast. "Did they…they don't normally do that. Do they."

Ben holds back the horror of imagining himself rather than the other Ren knight killing the woman. He's more grateful than ever that he's been collected by his Uncle Luke.

He adjusts his hold on her before answering. "Not like that. Which…is surprising."

There is flicker of color and gentle laughter coming from her mind. Unconsciously, Ben sees Rey and the woman – darker skin and longer, fuller hair – lying on the warm grass and watching the sun rise with a bottle between them; a vision of her past with the woman.

"It wasn't your fault," he warns her.

"Yes," Rey affirms. "It is. It's because – "

"It's because I left them," says Ben forcefully.

"It's because we came to get you." Rey corrects him. "You wouldn't be here if – "

"Yes, I would have!" Ben leans away to look at her. "Don't give yourself all the credit. You didn't force me onto the freighter. You didn't carry me when I was unconscious. I carried you, remember?"

Though the night is cast in dark indigo and faceted moonlight, her skin is dreadfully stained with tears. "I almost died. That's what it took."

Ben blinks, not expecting that. It's rather…it's never been mentioned in that way.

He is left to sort out his thoughts until one thing remains clear. "We cannot linger on this for long. There's more that I have to train you for. He may not have known your relationship to the woman, but he most likely arranged the execution to provoke a premature reaction from us."

 _Us_. Rey can't believe he said that, and not _you_.

"I'll…I'll have to try harder, to – " _hiccup_ " – Block these emotional taps he makes on me," Rey worries in a croaked voice. "I feel like…I might get carried away, trying to design a positive mental vision-thing that I'll be left open to attack."

"That's not what I was referring to. There's one last technique we can try that he won't expect." Ben had been looking forward to propose this. "We go on the offensive and invade his mind."

Rey freezes, thinking she must have mistaken him. Shrugging from his arms, she leans away and glares at him. "R'you mental?"

"I am perfectly serious. What you did to me in the first five minutes of meeting me could not have been done by a seasoned Jedi. You resisted my mind probe and impregnated my innermost desires, my deepest fears. Somehow I know you can do the same to him."

Rey looks away, shaking her head. "You're asking too much."

"So is everyone in the Resistance." Ben is disappointed at her lack of confidence. "You're too worried about falling to the Dark Side, and yet you brought me into the Light. How can you still doubt yourself?" he demands.

Rey's expression darkens. "Because none of this fucking matters."

The way her voice drifts into the air worries Ben into anchoring her somehow. "You are capable of destroying him. He knows it. Allow yourself to grieve tonight, and then let it go – "

"Ohhh, fucking…hells!" Rey explodes, wrestling herself from Ben's startled grip. "Fucking Jedi and this – this inhuman practice of not feeling anything, of 'letting things go'! It's like, disrespectful. How can they be the most respected people in the galaxy when they are commanded to think so little of, of things that hurt! 'Be kind to people but don't get too close, or you'll get burned'? Kriff. No wonder they all die all the time. They're stubborn in their ways and it fails them."

Ben inhales, shocked at her unabashed comment. He knows she includes how he's killed all the Padawans fifteen years ago, and regrets how he's pitied her.

But he also…agrees with her. It was his first transgression against the Jedi, one he admitted to Uncle Luke as an adolescent before; not being able to live like normal people with families and loved ones. Clearly it was something his grandfather Anakin didn't concede to.

"It's because we feel so strongly, all the time through the Force. We both can feel the lives of all the creatures in the sea right now; on a more populated planet, an unrefined channel of the Force can allow us to feel every _single living thing_ in the world. Even an entire star system." Ben thinks of the billions of lives snatched away through a sharp red light, so like his old lightsaber. "The Hosnian system…I know how to tune them out, but everything from the oldest, most crippled beings with slower heartbeats to the fainter ones of the unborn…I know how all of them feel, and I always will. That is the price we pay for our power: every song of life in the universe."

He squares his gaze at her. "Why do you think you are such a mess right now? You could have killed the both of us a few minutes ago with the water, all because of one woman who died off-planet."

Rey turns into stone for a second. "Jess…was my friend," she says fiercely.

"Which is why Jedi are not supposed to have friends. No family. Only the Force," he adds, remembering the way his mother had to leave him in Uncle Luke's hands…and even then, Luke never treated himself as family to Ben, only a Jedi Master.

Rey looks more lost than ever. She must have known these things; Luke had to have told her. Yet another reminder of why he must have refused to train her. She's too tainted with humanity.

Then Rey says something Ben never, ever could have expected from this woman. "I wish I never was a Jedi," she laments with intense clarity. "I wish…I wish I were back on Jakku. I wish I hadn't been born."


	21. Chapter 21

I need a Teacher

By TheOneAndOnlySlayer

Chapter 21 complete

Ben feels his stomach drop. How can she…

Automatically he thinks of that shameful first encounter of this half-starved little chit, kicking him into the ground like a schoolyard whelp. In the half-dozen following encounters, she had managed to score dozens more ego-bursting moves on his sorry ass: Force-pushing him into a wall like he was a toy on a string, evading him by jumping off a cliff and onto the back of a passing giant bird, and even slapping him in the face when they had driven both their lightsabers out of reach.

He hated her. He regretted his search for Luke Skywalker because of how his path jumpstarted hers into self-discovery of the Force. That hatred had reluctantly bent toward respect, then mellowed into admiration for her growing skill.

Throughout this evolution, Kylo and Ben's feelings for Rey had always been stung with jealousy. It erupted now for her ignorance of the gifts she possessed.

"You are a _coward_."

Rey's eyes flash. "I know when to admit I won't win. I don't plan to damn my soul, Ben! I'm not going to fall into a trap when I know it's there waiting for me!"

"You will not bend to him," he tells her. "You are stronger than me, stronger than anyone I've ever known! The way you handle fear should speak for itself. Fear has threatened to break Jedi for years. It's how the Sith are made. You have been shaped by it – "

"Fear of death or drowning is nothing compared to this," Rey answers, agitated. "This is so much worse. You're asking me to get inside his head. His head, his gigantic head is a warzone, Ben, it's, it's a torture chamber and a bomb all rolled into one! I'd either burn or become Dark the second I touch it!"

Rey's voice is unsteady and she has to calm herself. "Kriff. Fuck it. This was – " _The stupidest idea_ , she wants to say, but it would discredit everything Ben's done for them, and her. "I'm not strong enough to do this. I'll fail. We should have just planned for an airstrike to blow the shit out of him."

"You know that he will survive anything less than an attack from a Jedi Knight," Ben corrects her sharply.

"A half-arsed trained Jedi Apprentice, you mean? Who can't even bury her emotions! You weren't there when he – when he – "

Rey feels another sob sting its way up her throat. She stubbornly faces the water.

This was her idea. She was the one who walked into his cell and proposed this idea to defeat Snoke, the monster with all the puppet strings. He was the one who could not believe it, who was sunken in doubt and disbelief. How unexpected the roles have been reversed, and so drastically.

She can't shake off the way he – Snoke – had mentally attacked her with such speed, forcing his way through her soul and tearing apart at her intricate memories, her fears, the things that made her blood freeze. Ben is skilled and clever, but he isn't merciless enough to prepare her against a creature like Snoke. Rey is sure the old Sith master will tear her in two again.

"He killed Luke. He killed your uncle, Ben."

Ben's gaze is steady, as if it was his fault. "I know."

"No, you don't," she affirms piteously. "You didn't see him. The way Snoke took him…it was like gutting out a fish. Just, it was over so quick, but the – the look on his face. The look in his eyes!" She's trying to make Ben understand, but her voice croaks. "He was so scared, _he was soo scared_ …"

Rey wants to tear _herself_ , everything in two. She wants to stay here, on this little coast and let the universe burn itself far away from her. She wants…

She knows she's voiced her defeat before. It sounds utterly petulant and frail, but it's all she can think. "I don't think I can face him again."

Ben doesn't respond for a while. It's impossible to know what he's thinking. She won't try to sense him through the Force, either. She's afraid of how her failure reads in his head.

She can tell, though, that she's lost something great here. She feels so heavy and just wants to drift into the tide, and disappear.

Never has the Force felt like such a curse instead of a gift.

Unfortunately Ben senses this thought and decides to comment on it. "You believe the Force is a curse."

Rey swallows. "I didn't mean for you to hear that thought."

"After everything it's given you." There's an ever-so-slight tick of outrage, of petulance.

"I don't - ! I don't mean it like that. But how could the Force have chosen someone like me? Why wasn't Luke strong enough?"

"Because he's been buried in his defeat," reminded Ben icily. "I did that to him."

" _I know you did_ ," Rey responds through clenched teeth.

"And you have defeated four of the Knights of Ren. You killed four of my former comrades, two in one single fight. In your first hour of your calling _you_ bested _me_ , upended me like I had just emerged into the Force, not you! No," he spat, shaking his head in determination. "You don't defeat a warrior who has trained since _childhood_."

Rey remembered the surging confidence that day, strumming through her like she was a musical instrument. She had felt so infinite. How has she fallen so far into this misery, this fear? She's caved.

"All I want is to go home," she admitted tiredly. "Luke should be here, not me. I should have died."

They were at an impasse. They both stared out at the moon over the water, distracted by the lonely horizon before them. Out there, the First Order swelled with renewed power.

It was a long time before either of them spoke. Ben's voice was surprisingly gentle when he began:

"I said the exact same thing years ago. That I thought the Force, being a Skywalker, was a curse. Fifteen years ago I saw my destiny, and I…I trembled. I prayed that I was mistaken, but I couldn't ignore what I was meant to do."

Rey glares at him strangely. "To become a vessel of the Dark Side?"

"Yes. But before that I was no different than yourself: full of some great gift that I had _no_ understanding of, that people told me of its worth. And even then, there were people who were scared of it. My father was scared of _me_ , and I was only seven. And then we were all lectured into believing in something far greater than ourselves; all of us, picked up and collected by my uncle, learning about the Force, and how to pick up a sword and defend ourselves, but we lacked the bigger picture. We lacked knowing that this fountain that flows through us, that this is what people have died for, and killed to protect."

Ben turns to Rey, who's been watching his noble profile carefully. "I have left two masters now. My loyalty is compromised….I do not deserve your empathy, yet you still accept…you have not forsaken me yet."

Rey tries to ignore whatever deeper meaning Ben's trying to convey. "But…your mother is – "

"My mother's love is…inherent and unconditional. Your…your company is different." Ben Solo licks his lips and shakes his head, trying to make her understand. "I may have been the servant of our enemy, but I have never felt my entire being feel _joy_ in belonging to one thing. Not until the day I found you. I have gone mad trying to understand why I have kept being drawn into the Light. I thought it was a weakness…that you were my weakness. Only now I understand."

Rey almost takes a step back when he moves a little closer. His eyes are deep as black holes, expression so honest and pure it unnerves her more than when it was stripped down to rage months before.

"You are my strength. Don't you see? I have gone back into the Light because of it. And the only thing that I believe in now…is you."

Oh. The words whisper into her veins, forever inscribed. _The only thing I believe in now is you._

This man was a monster when they first met. In less than a year, according to him, Rey's made him back into the man he should have been: an accomplished Jedi with a devoted heart.

Rey finds herself churning with excitement, yet still as death. She won't dare breathe. She imagines this is how it's like to float in space, experiencing a single infinite moment before possibly blacking out.

"I will not let you fall into the dark," he swears. There is an impulsive, desperate drive in his tone that arrests her. It is gone in another moment, back to the weighted calm. "Tomorrow we will try again," Ben suggests carefully. "You will not be alone in this. Do you understand?"

Rey finds herself forgetting her anxiety moments before. Right now she wants to sleep. She nods and together they turn back to the castle. They will try again another day.


	22. Chapter 22

I need a teacher

By TheOneAndOnlySlayer

Chapter 22

When Finn wakes up, he….he wishes he hadn't.

He's lying in the blankets, all propped and snug like a doll. It's far too stuffy and reminds him of his Stormtrooper armor.

He doesn't know how he got here. All he remembers is the roar of the engines and Rey's panicked eyes. He was so angry he could have punched her in the teeth, even though he _knows_ in his heart none of it is her fault.

He thinks he must have been dreaming of Jess. _Jess_. Her warm body and the way she loved him, really loved him.

He hears Rey not by her footsteps but by the telltale sound of her leggings brushing against each other. Finn hopes she can't sense that he's awake.

"Finn? You awake?"

Kriff. Of course she can.

He doesn't speak. Can't, because his throat is so tight.

She puts a hand on his arm but says nothing else, waiting.

After a moment he croaks, in a wet voice, "Just do your job, Rey."

Rey is painfully still. "What do you mean?"

Finn swallows. _You learn how to kill him, fast,_ he thinks, concentrating on the words so she can hear him, _or I will._

He doesn't want to talk anymore. He just wants to sleep, to not think. He's not sure if he wants to imagine Jess's face, because…oh, Force, it hurts to think like this.

"I want to _sleep_ , Rey," he admits. "Can you…?"

The hand on his bicep tightens just a bit, but it's soothing as Rey lulls him under again, like being tucked under blankets by a mother. He craves this weakness and will hold onto it for just a little longer.

Ssssssssssssssssssssssssssss

 _There is a phantom pull drawing her to the shadow. She struggles and bites, but the jaws come ever closer and she's almost fallen under, trapped. It's impossible to get out._

 _Rey shivers from the oncoming dark. She's unarmed and the walls are closing in, even though she can't_ see _them!_

 _But then there's a gentle hand guiding her away. The sensation is sweet and soothing it warms the marrow in her bones; sated in a way that makes her belly squirm in heated delight, Rey ducks her head under the watchful figure's care._

 _It's so much like…the dream. Of her pressed next to him, so real and obscene that she could feel the shifting of her clothes around her stomach and thighs; her breastband suddenly feeling too tight and scratchy, and wanting to claw her fingernails into soft, cool flesh and black-as-night-hair…._

 _I have gone mad trying to understand…you are my strength…._

… _..I will not let you fall to the dark._

ssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss

Rey blinks heavily under the silver morning light. Force, she misses where sunlight truly meant warmth and not this bleak, shivering stuff. She's alone, but Finn, wherever he is on their hideout, is in passable spirits.

There's a tightness in her that has nothing to do with losing Jess or learning how to destroy Snoke. It's something else, combined with a squeamish feeling in her gut, a tickling in her throat and a lightness in her head.

She remembers how Ben found her last night, her power rampant, ready to drown them both, and immediately feels ashamed. He must be so tired of her. But the truth in his face, when he told her all those things – they're all a complicated mess of words that it's difficult to examine each of them. And when he said the last part, "the only thing I believe in now is you," – Oh holy Force, it's like staring at a brilliant kaleidoscope for too long and getting your vision all confused-like.

She gets up because of Finn's words last night, and because she's really not going to spend time dwelling on her talk with Ben. Nope. Stretching old muscles, down to cracking the bones in her toes, neck and ankles, Rey begins to feel different, compared to the drought-like hopelessness the day before. She has so much to do. When she runs a hand through her hair, she recoils because it's definitely past the breaking point of being dirty and oily.

After the past few days she's had…yeah, she's overdue in feeling like a normal human. She needs to really bathe, not just scrub water under her armpits. Bath, then meditation.

There's a hygiene kit with very basic and miniscule staples, including a washcloth, soap and some stuff for her hair. Nearby is a small bucket where she's stuffed some underclothes and a shirt. Finn's left a spare undershirt that smells nicer than her. The sleeves are far too wide and her breastband is exposed, but it'll do for training. She has a shorter pair of pants that reach only halfway down her thighs, but gods and stars, she needs to wash her other clothes, too.

In the middle of her movements she senses Ben, too. He's not nearby, but he's checking on her. Caught unawares, she finds herself covering her half-stripped body. There's no point to this because she's _alone_ – why does she _care_ all of a sudden?

 _Get a bloody grip_ , Rey stubbornly shrugs. She already feels a plan forming in her head and doesn't want to muddle it yet with confusing thoughts about…things. Feelings. Just…she needs a clean start today, to purge her emotions like she _knows_ Ben has been doing in his private little room.

There's a nice little pool area by the rocks where she won't be seen. Stripping down to her underclothes and shaking out her hair, she kicks off her shoes and wades into the water.

The quiet around her makes her believe the water is at a better temperature. One of the more unbelievable practices Luke told her about the Force was that she could manage a body temperature in extreme weather conditions. She doesn't need to do it now, but….

She searches through the Force, exercising her wealth of Light out into the water. She dips her head back in – unconsciously thinking of how Ben, you know, dipped her under the water like she was a fancy stage dancer or summat. Ha, now if that didn't look romantic.

It is the most absurd and inappropriate thing to think about now.

Leaning out of the water, Rey grasps for anything, anyone, besides _him_ : there's Luke and the way his eyes became so blue, blue like the water when he taught her how to swim for the very first time. She could barely hold half of her nose underneath because she came back up sputtering, and Luke could only giggle because swimming was _not_ his forte, either.

She smiles, sadly. It will always be like this, won't it? Thinking of faces from the past, not remembering them as well over time, even after a week because they're dead?

There will be peace. People mourn their loved ones all the time. The Jedi must, too.

"I love," she admits. "There is strength in love. And it can't be taken away."

There is a kindness that settles her right then, and it feels like home after the stresses of being away from it. She's comforted to know she's found her center. There is so much to do: more training, more focus, more purpose that cannot be avoided.

She scrubs her skin with the faces of Luke, Jess and even Han in front of her. She thinks of Jess's strong, lava-warm arms around her in their last parting embrace as she massages her hair with soap. She wonders what Han would have said, if he were alive now…and if Rey would have told him about dream-kissing his son.

There is a slight intake of breath that quickly descends into teeth-gritting. Maybe it's the fact that she's half-naked on the beach where anyone can find her.

 _Stop. Thinking. About. Ben. Solo._

Honestly, it just gives her more incentive to meditate right now.

Settling on one of the flatter rocks, Rey opens her mind and lets the jostling, distracting images slip from her like oil form water. In and out. Feel the life-force of all the things around her; the flitting, darting creatures in the water, namely, are like musical strings being plucked. If Rey is quiet enough, attuned to just the right moment, she can hear music in the Force.

She remains this way, expanding her listening until she swears she can feel the moss grow or the whistling of wind under the beechpeckers' wings, for almost two hours. When it is time to get into the core of her workout – the "lifting weights" part, as Poe called it – Rey decides she can try to lift some of the boulders lining the beach.

The slight strain is welcoming in her body. Each boulder must be as big and as wide as herself, and perhaps ten times as heavy. Her brows furrow just a bit in concentration. She loosens her jaw to think of the heartbeats in and around the castle. She won't open her eyes, but she can count six of these giant things levitating in the air.

Now…the tricky part is to make them all rotate like Ben did the day of her second lesson. That was easy, spinning vividly about like a little orbital system.

Defeating Snoke requires a stronger reserve of her power. If not all of it.

They've all said she's powerful: Leia, Luke, and even Kylo Ren and _Snoke_. Ben has commended her strength in the Force, albeit demanded where it all was when she seemed to fail in his lessons.

 _Snoke_ even wants her power. Rey understands this now. Her first failed encounter with him wasn't a duel, it was an audition.

This truly has unsettled her. She's not afraid of the Force - the Force has embraced her like the scent of a mother connecting itself to a child. It is ingrained in her, in her blood and in every breath she mingles with the air. It's her power she keeps buried underneath her; the fact that one flinch of a nasty thought, of jealousy or irritation could undo her concentration and, for example, fell one of the boulders onto someone's head. It courses through the veins of a person who's had to kill at nine years old, and still hasn't processed the guilt. She won't turn into some unstable star that can swallow everything in its path into radiated dust because she can't _manage her abilities_. She can't slip and have that monster, that twisted freak who's subdued someone as stubborn, strong and noble as Ben Solo, break her into his service, too.

"You're getting better, doshka," says the Force-ghost of Anakin Skywalker in his native Huttese. Though he's transparent, his robes somehow pick up the sea breeze against Rey's bare shoulder.

She responds, equally fluent. "I've had a lot to think about." She scoots over to let him sit next to her.


	23. Chapter 23

I need a Teacher

By TheOneAndOnlySlayer

Chapter 23 complete

Mindful of her rotating rocks, Rey slows down their speed overhead. "Ben saw how I pulled down a TIE fighter and tried to eject the First Order pilot at the same time. He's probably mad jealous - but when I did that, it was a one-time thing. It'll be pretty useful to do it again."

"I'll say," Anakin replies. "Tell me of my grandson's lessons. What else has he taught you?"

"Memory exercises," she says in a lingered tone. She _has_ been making progress. "Not to let someone dictate my mind and to be in control of it, even with an invader inside. Like, controlling a dream." Rey's mental image of Snoke staring her down with his dead eyes change to Kylo's vivid brown ones, glinting like spinning gears from their lessons. "…And to surrender."

Anakin perks. "Surrender?"

Rey exhales and watches all six boulders race across the sky, stopping suddenly almost a mile out to sea. "Like, surrendering to fear, admitting it's there and letting yourself be exposed to it. Like, calculating it? If that makes sense. He made better sense of it," she mutters. "Actually, for the first lesson he had me study this animal, a sand shark. He…he had me observe the basic instinct of the animal, like showing me how I could manipulate its next move because it was so concentrated on survival. I think…he didn't say it exactly, but I think he was having me realize I had fallen into that category. Snoke barely did a thing, he just poked and prodded me into a corner and watched me panic, until it…blinded me."

Rey closed her eyes and leaned back, feeling heavy with the reminder of her failure. "It was so easy. I walked into that fight with so much confidence. All I could think about was, 'this is the bastard who's ruined everything. He brought back the Empire, he took Ben when he was just a kid, he ruined Leia's family. He even brought back…y'know, Darth Vader 'n all that,'" she added quietly.

Anakin stared at the ocean, looking serene to any stranger who couldn't imagine his thoughts.

"In that moment you forgot your Jedi training."

Rey found herself nodding. "I had to try remembering it, as soon as I felt like I was losing."

"But it was too late," Anakin supplied correctly. "That was me, all the time. I lost my arm that way – Obi-Wan, my master, and I were tracking down this Sith that had organized the Separatists. He had been trying to assassinate my – well, not my wife at the time, but…oh, Force, I was just roiling with it, this drive to see him dead. I was an idiot. I barely lasted a few minutes. I'll tell you, I never admitted it to Obi-Wan, but losing to that senior citizen was embarrassing."

Rey hid a smile at his honesty. See, Anakin – Force-ghost Anakin, post-Vader – could have been a good teacher. The fact that he didn't hide anything from her was a welcome act. She felt she could trust him.

"I think…I see what Ben is getting at," Anakin muses. "I know what he's trying to show you. He may have trouble at saying what he means, but it…" he cast a smarmy grin. "Well, he certainly didn't get that from my side of the family. That's all on his scoundrel of a father's side."

"Ay! What a father-in-law you are," she mock-chided him in Huttese.

"One of your stones is dropping," Anakin pointed out.

"Oh," Rey said, waving a hand to lift one of the sagging rocks back to its 200-meter height above the water.

"So…okay, what was he trying to say, then?"

Anakin purses his lips, thinking for a bit. "Your fear…he thinks it's shaped you into who you are now. It's why you have the making of a Dark Side warrior, but you've avoided it much strongly than I have. You've never…really hated before. You have, _just_ – not to the point where you've lingered on it. Even that fat waddler you had to work for on Jakku. Even when you were hungry. Even Ben."

The boulders slow their orbit just by a fraction. Rey considers this, but she doesn't believe it.

"I thought…no, I definitely have." She thinks of the Twi'lek girl who almost killed her in her sleep. She thinks of when she roared and raged out her grievances at Ben-as-Kylo-Ren, on only their second fight, spittle and tears hanging from her face.

"I know you have," Anakin answers, "You've told us how wrong and unfair it is that Ben's family still wishes for him to come home and renounce his sins, even when that was not possible, and your parents abandoned you as an innocent. It _is_ wrong," he assures Rey when she feels the sting of the reminder. "But…even against this feeling, a part of you, very quickly, began to empathize with him. And you realized it fully yesterday, when you…kind of flirted with the dark."

Rey only nods. "Right. Right, so…how can that help the next time I see Snoke?"

"Well, forgive an old man for getting far off-track," he laughed. "Snoke…he may be powerful. He may have beaten you once. But, he is also as mortal as you are. Use his Sith training against him."

Rey's eyes slide into skepticism. "That…sounds like a trap. No, wait. First it sounds exactly what any Jedi would say when facing a Sith, and second, Ben thinks getting inside _his_ head to manipulate him is the best bet to win the fight. The Dark will swallow me."

"Don't worry about getting lost in his head just yet. There's a more simplified way of doing this." The Jedi actually slides around and crosses his legs into a meditative pose. "The Sith say that fear leads to doubt, and anger. The Jedi say you need to observe how the fear controls you, and then overcome it. Do this before your emotions control you. Look at it like you do any ship's console. It's just lying there before you. Find out how it works, how it manipulates you – then manipulate _it_."

Rey inhales. His advice sounds too easy, like most advice, but she moves on. "I've already covered drowning, death…the violence. I guess people dying around me." Jess. "I know that…it may not be enough, but – "

"Being loved, really loved, and loving in return is far greater than any power in the galaxy," Anakin tells her gently. "It never goes away, even when we do." There is a tenderness in his words that Rey covets like a balm.

"And then falling to the Dark Side," she adds. "But it's more complicated than that. What's next? What am I missing?"

"Rey," Anakin leans forward. "What have you been fighting against since childhood? Since Jakku? Every step, every agonizing moment of the day. Every challenge, from finding water to fighting off bandits."

"Fear of starving?"

"No, think further. The shadow of your family coming to get you, and having to pretend that it's just a matter of time. After Jakku, you suddenly had all these new responsibilities: the Jedi, the war, your new family. They all counted on you, more than the best pilot in the Resistance. More than Leia. And Kylo Ren: if he beat you, it would be all over. He hurt Finn, and Poe. He's hurt people you've come to love. Only you are strong enough to fight him off. And Luke…Force, the look on your face," Anakin recalled with a soft chuckle. "You had the most hopeful expression. You came to a man who had lost almost all hope, this impossible task to make him believe again in the Force. You did that. You had no idea what you were walking into. It's all been too easy. Surely, there had to be a slip-up somewhere."

Rey finds herself hanging onto every word the dead Jedi speaks. "And there were," he says. "People died. You got wounded with Kylo and the other Knights. You lost someone yesterday and you weren't there to save her, even though you've killed a few Ren knights like the bastard that killed your friend. One slip-up – you've known since Jakku that that's all it takes to fail."

 _Failure_.

Rey snaps. She glances up worriedly at the rocks spinning madly in the sky, rushed like her heartbeat yet unwavering.

"Failure," she says, unsure.

"Yep," Anakin says. "And hope."

"Why?"

"You never even showed anyone you were scared of failing; the war effort, the Jedi legacy, as rare and near-extinct as it is. Excluding Ben, you're the only one left. As soon as you woke up from Snoke's nightmare coma thing, and the dozen of you guys landed here, all you've been is positive. Since then, you've declined. Is it because you're near Ben? Who, in your mind, is the ultimate picture of failure?"

Rey is breathless, affronted at such a bare representation of her interaction with the man. "I – what?"

"He's failed everyone, and yet he's the one you need to help you rip Snoke apart. Since then, you've felt afraid you will end up like him."

"Because I can! Because – look at what I'm doing! Snoke would love to make a pet out of me," she exclaims, worried.

"Yeah, and look at what you said to Ben last night! You wanted to die, to go home. Don't you understand? He's depending on you. He needs you to win. You can't see it in his eyes? The hope?"

Rey starts. It's true. It's freaked her out, badly.

"He…I don't know why he said those things," she admits to him. To herself. "Why he needs me…" she doesn't want to gaze directly into Anakin Skywalker's blue eyes, the same ones as Luke's. "He looked at me like I was, I don't know – "

The most precious thing in the world.

She's not sure if she wants to talk about this. "I must make a crap Jedi, huh?" she jokes with a hesitant laugh. "All of these things I worry and obsess about."

"We're complex beings, Rey. Why do you think Jedi used to be initiated as toddlers? There's nothing wrong with you. You're a person who just feels. These fears are what made you. The way you've let them linger near you without haunting you is…" He trails off, looking away.

Rey thinks of the boulders, each probably a half-dozen tons, each a potential projectile weapon if a fighter were to pass overhead. "I think I'm afraid of my abilities, too. The idea that I could hurt someone." Was Han really once scared of his own kid, as Ben admitted last night?

"You're afraid of the gifts you've been given," Anakin supplies. "And…other things, too."

Rey's eyes narrow at his tone. "What d'you mean?"

When the young man looks back at her, Rey regrets asking. "I told you…being loved and loving in return is the greatest thing in the galaxy."

The grin on his sunny face is mischievous, and Rey scowls at the thought of curling fingers into jet-black hair and her face against a very prominent nose.

"Kriff. Stop it," Rey commands as she gets to her feet. "I don't know why I'm opening up to _you_. Tell Luke I want to talk to him!"

"You're stuck with me, doshka!" the Force-ghost yells at her retreating back in mild glee. Rey ignores him with a bitter shake of her head.

It's all because Finn showed her his memories of him and Jess, petting each other and lying skin-to-skin that's got her all _distracted._ But why doesn't she dream of Poe? He's sexy enough. Blatantly. Jess, too. Ben's just intimidating, even when he's shirtless. Even when he's quiet and contemplative-like.

What the fuck. Why does she even bother….

The boulders drop simultaneously into the ocean. The tide ripples heavily and there's a tremor from the movement. Underneath the sand there's a disturbance; not from the Force, but from something living underneath. Something with a rising temper and a greedy stomach.

Rey glares down at the sand in realization. She's got an idea.


	24. Chapter 24

I need a Teacher

By TheOneAndOnlySlayer

Chapter 24 complete

In the morning, Ben is shaking. It is like withdrawal: his confidence, his calm exterior has been ruptured.

Rey was a Force-damned mess. Touching her last night and feeling the white-hot pain in her soul sucked something out of him. It was like watching a hurricane emerge from a gravesite – so much massive emotion ready to thwart anything that dared to contain it.

When they parted last night, Ben came back here to his cell and stared helplessly at the dark blue of the night, at the stone walls.

He was failing her.

It crushed him more than he could explain. This was supposed to be his redemption, his reason to live. He had literally nothing else, save for the black robes he wore as Kylo.

It left him gaping, just as he saw the girl, unapologetically naked in her grief. Never had Rey looked so vulnerable in her youth before. She said she wanted to _die_. The girl who challenged a monster with a flick of her wrist finally bowed under the death of one pilot girl and suddenly it was all over for her. She couldn't be this _fragile_. Not his equal.

Ben all but begged her to hold on. To hope for a little longer.

The desperation he sensed from her made him stumble to where he had been keeping his knives. Kneeling like a sacrifice, he held one of them up in the dark, imagining the stiletto-thin razor gushing from his belly instead of the child's-play slits along his chest and ribcage.

He hadn't really considered doing that. Ending his life. It would be a waste, he understood; he wasn't a fool. What made him actually put the knife down was a voice in the air. Not Snoke, not the mask of his former self. Something softer yet deeper at the same time.

 _What do you think you're doing?_

ssssssssssssssssssssssssssss

As the silver dawn expands, he begins to anticipate a visitor. She hasn't come to see him since before Rey's training. This alone makes the fallen Jedi perk under his stone calm.

"Ben."

He swallows without understanding that he is nervous. His mother wouldn't be blindingly sentimental enough to call him son or sweetheart. Just Ben.

What does he call her, now? Once, it was always mom. Not mother. Not even "my mother" because it sounded so formal. She may have been a princess, but she married a criminal, so she certainly wasn't a polished individual.

She's standing by the entrance, very much like she used to when she found him in his room.

"Am I…can I come in?"

He's baffled. It can't possibly sound this normal.

"I'm still your prisoner," he reminds her matter-of-factly.

This solidifies Leia's intention. She comes in and crouches down to his level. "Everything okay with Rey?"

Okay, no. He can't do this. Looking past her at a stone slab, he answers, "She's meditating. She needs time on her own." _As do I._

"But the two of you are getting somewhere with her training." Ben's lip curls at the switch from nitpicking parent to General.

He turns his deep brown eyes to hers, and waits. "Why are you here?"

She hasn't come to see him, even to bring him meals; although Ben has been perfectly capable looking after himself. It's a little ridiculous waiting for these chain-smoking, blaster-carrying goons to hand him some half-assed fish plate when he can cook better. She hasn't even tried to feel for him through their connection, louder in its proximity than in the past fifteen years.

"I was thinking," she starts out. She's so small and fierce, voice painfully even. "We may have to leave soon and, I know you've been busy." She crosses her arms. "We never talked about…about your uncle. Being gone."

Defiantly, Ben looks away. He feels a little vulnerable because he's not wrapped up in his outer robes. He feels exposed and more young than he remembers. He picks up on her feelings, too, that she is gazing at her estranged boy.

It's as if he hadn't killed his father a year ago.

He hopes she doesn't want to have a discussion about Uncle Luke. It would be…it can't fix things. He is beyond fixing for family's sake. She cannot accept her murdering son, he reasons.

But she surprises him. "I know he's not with us, but I want to have some sort of funeral service for him. It made me think, with Jess…she was known by a lot of us, and…It doesn't seem right that we…that I just forget about them and join the others." She's careful in facing him, but she's so tired. "I want to part with him properly."

Oh, this is so much worse.

"You want me to be there for this?" It sounds a little jarring, blunt.

"You are his nephew. You…Rey told me you stepped in, to help."

Ben purses his lips, unable to disagree.

"Ben."

Fuck. That's her mom voice. Not her bitchy I-will-cut-you diplomat voice, or her sarcastic my-husband-is-an-idiot voice. It's the steel-thin calm that she only uses on Ben Solo.

"I lost my brother last week. He was all I have. I don't have…anyone else."

When she stopped, Ben fears she will cry, but she doesn't.

"All I have is you. I know what you're trying to do: trying to make things right by helping us. But," she argues, shaking her head. "You've got so much you need to do, too. You have so many emotional wrongs you need to make right. You cannot jump in and help or consult when you feel it's safe to do so. You need to let yourself be torn down. You need to surrender. Do you understand what I'm saying?"

Oh, fuck her. Ben closes his eyes. He gives in to the most humane gesture in front of this woman, by putting his head in his hands. She knows he's shown his agitation this way, since he was a schoolboy.

"Do you expect me to say anything?" Not _do I have to say anything?_ It sounds too churlish.

"No. Just. If I start sobbing, I want you to hold me. I'm wearing Finn out, and he's going to be a mess on his own. He and…the girl – "

"I know." Ben's nose is thick. He sniffles and nods once.

Leia sighs. "There's one more thing."

Ben manages not to groan.

"I don't expect to survive this – all of this – when it finally ends."

Ben's stomach drops. What.

"I told your father I want to be buried next to my mother. Your grandmother, on Naboo. Luke and I had…" her eyes water and Ben's almost do, too. He clenches his fists.

Leia's using all of her self-preservation to not cry, not even sniffle because her nose is thick, too. They're both providing each other ignorance of their emotions by looking in aimless directions: him at the wall, her at the floor.

"That nice place in the memorial gardens outside of Theed. I took you when you were six. Do you remember?"

Ben has to breathe a little before he can answer her. "Yes."

"Will you promise me you'll take me there?"

Ben can tear the stars, the galaxy into pieces if it meant not having to suffer this.

"I will."

The birds call to each other outside of the castle. There's a warm breeze and the sun shines through, cleansing them both.

"As long as you…"

Leia tears her gaze away from the ground and looks up at her dark-haired son.

"They will not spare me the decency of a burial. No one will. Don't let them get my…my remains. Just burn me somewhere."

Leia feels her eyes flood and has to look skyward to keep calm. _No. They will not take you._ Her oath is unexpectedly belligerent in his mind. _I'd die before I'd let that happen._

Ben shoots his head up. He cannot believe he's hearing this. It's almost deceitful.

She loves him. He is her boy, and she will always protect him.

"Thank you," he manages.

She nods once and finds the sense to walk out. It's too much. He follows her through the Force as she walks briskly down the stairs, avoiding eye contact from anyone. She has found a spot to cry in private, not as loud as she wishes, but no one will find her. She cries, feeling so helpless and cursing her Skywalker heritage. She had hated it since the beginning. She loved Luke, loved having a brother after losing her Alderaan family, but in her heart she would have forsaken their blood relation because of Vader.

She even hates Anakin Skywalker. She hates the Jedi. She hates herself for enduring.

Ben severs the connection and wipes the tears from his face.

Sssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss

Finn has been wanting to ask Kylo (Ben Solo, sorry) about something. He's waited to let the most important part of the Resistance's mission, to let Ben teach Rey how to fight Snoke, for a while now. For the first few days he thought he was giving them space to meditate and whatever (never mind wanting to be left the fuck alone after yesterday), but Kivi had made that comment over breakfast that it's the super-obedient Stormtrooper in him that won't give him the courage.

Before Jakku, before everything changed for him and his friends, Finn had heard a lot about the fearsome Kylo Ren. He had only seen him three times before the village massacre in search of Luke's Skywalker.

The first had been some random passing in the hallway. Finn had caught the black robes from a hundred feet away and immediately trained himself to keep an even pace. That was it, however he swore he sensed the violence in that phantom warrior.

The second was during some air strike drill on Starkiller base. Down in the sanitation unit, Finn's commanding officer had been reporting to General Hux. Finn had never seen the General in person, but had gathered he was an impenetrable, incorruptible man. That had changed as soon as Kylo Ren crept in like a shadow and swiftly accosted him over something. He could not hear what they were saying but was surprised at how the masked man grabbed the General like they were in a bar.

The third…well, the third was when Phasma had conducted some training drills and Kylo Ren had his lightsaber for his own practice.

A blaster bolt had strayed over to his direction, messing up the knight's concentration. Everyone had stopped. Phasma had shouted in anger and apprehended the mistaken soldier. He was shoved over to Ren, who hadn't so much as cursed.

It was all over when the knight whirled his sword and beheaded the Stormtrooper. He had thrown his lightsaber until it spun madly, and then called it back in a perfect arc through the Force.

Then of course there were all the events that followed Jakku: interrogating Poe, kidnapping Rey, killing his own father, slicing up Finn's spine like a gutted kill. All he was missing, in appearance right now, was his mask.

Still… Finn felt the change. Compared to Poe, Finn was surprisingly willing to go along with this change of loyalty. Maybe it had to do with them both once belonging to the First Order.

Plus, Rey was definitely capable of fighting off Kylo in a fight. They used to joke about how they "kept meeting up the same way across the galaxy."

Now, all pretenses were dropped. The tall man was quieter, less prone to outbursts. Finn wasn't really sure what was going on with the two of them. Just because it was Jedi stuff didn't mean Finn shouldn't care.

He had taken his time that morning, walking aimlessly along the cliffs where the wind was the wildest. Finn supposed he was seeking an imitation to calm his mind like the Jedi do. He put Jess's warm brown eyes away for now and strode through the broken hallways to where Ben slept.

He strides past the two fellas who sit too many pace s way from the door. "Hey. Ben."

He really wasn't used to calling this guy Ben Solo yet, but he's trying to make things less awkward for everybody.

Ben Solo himself looks surprised, too, so Finn rushes in. "Can we talk?"

He casts a careless eyebrow over to the guards. "If the gentlemen don't mind."

At Finn's silent look the taller guy jokes, "He's been on impeccable behavior."

Forgetting about their presence entirely, Finn sits across from Ben. He doesn't bother thinking how weird it is to be collaborating with this new, mysterious ghost of his violent "boss."

"There's been something I've been meaning to ask you – "

"About whether you have a cognitive anomaly from the other Stormtroopers," Ben finishes. "I looked at your background file myself for any previous offenses. There were none. There was nothing to suggest your conditional training was flawed. There is no variation between you and the past Stormtroopers you've encountered in battle."

Finn's youthful face pinches in confusion. "So then how am I – "

"A defector? I have no idea." His voice softens as he faces the sky. "I certainly didn't expect to do the same."

This comment falls heavily between them, an unexpected recognition of their shared status. Finn tries not to think back on his past encounters with Kylo Ren; the way the wounded man held out his red saber and yelled " _traitor_!"

"Is that all?" Ben's voice breaks in.

"No. I wanted to ask you…what else you know about the Stormtroopers' programming. You were close in command with General Hux. He must have shared his plans on…our conditioning."

"Ahh. I see. You want to encourage your comrades to turn coat. Subterfuge. Like a virus. I'm discouraged to see it's taken you this long to discover this idea."

 _Whatever, you superior fucko._ "Can it be done?"

"I suppose," he muses carefully. "Not from here."

"When we get off this rock, it'll be important you tell us how it can happen." Finn leans forward, honesty piercing his tone. "When we get back to the base, you won't be kept in the same conditions as here, and we'll need you to come with us."

Ben hates how this little man is talking. He's resting on the balls of his feet and leaning his head in, like he's looking down on Ben. It reminds him terribly of Snoke.

Not that he has anything to worry about. Even sitting down, Ben is so tall and long-framed that he is at an even height with the boy.

"Let me think on what you might need." It's suggesting he needs to be left alone now.

Finn gets it and heads for the door.

"They won't respond to the Resistance as easily as a switch in their heads."

Finn shrugs. "It's worth a try."

Ben tilts his head. For once, there is a glint of something earnest there in his eyes. Finn might later joke how it gave him ektavi butterflies in his stomach. "Try sending out a personal message. They'll follow you."


	25. Chapter 25

I need a teacher

By TheOneAndOnlySlayer

Chapter 25 complete

 _Surrender to the fight. Lose yourself to your enemy._

Blood runs in rivulets down Rey's arm. It drips onto the sand. Rey is focusing on the sand shark. She knows it's down there.

There is a shuffling sound. The sand parts and the mottled brown sand shark, this time scarred with a torn nostril, hisses at the human. Its mouth is so big that Rey will pretty much be swallowed whole. It will digest her whole, too. She'll only die inside the creature by suffocation, drowning on its acidic stomach fluids.

Rey has lashed a leather strap to one half her lightsaber, which is tight around her wrist. She's sure she can outrun it, for some time. This forty-foot thing just ate its first large meal a few days ago and the digestion will slow it down today. She counts on this as she turns around and runs.

The sand shark lets out a roar that sounds like metal scraping together. The ground shakes as it dives back down. Rey can feel the thing gain speed. Her joints almost lock when the tremors move right underneath her.

It's trying to upend her. Rey braces herself as the animal crests upward. She bends her knees and tries to reach for anything on the scaly, horned back.

It bucks underneath her. Rey gathers her strength and hops off the animal through the Force. She lands a good distance away and bolts.

The rocks are nearby. They're slippery at this speed, but she keeps going.

She barely saw the sand shark last time to really understand its anatomy, let alone its limitations aboveground. It's following her.

 _But can you swim in the water, shark?_ Rey wonders as he races down the quarter-kilometer path jutting out from the coast.

Up in the tower, Ben is meditating. If everyone would just leave him the fuck alone, that would be great. It's reaching midday and he still hasn't been to see Rey. He doesn't care that she's afraid of probing Snoke's head. He'll have her practice on him. It's a sacrifice he hopes she realizes is one of the last things he holds dear to himself. She will fight to control his mind, subdue him like a tightly-lashed wild animal and bend him under her will. Paralyze him. He knows she can do it; doesn't matter if the act is a little dark.

A brush of tightly controlled panic swats him from his concentration. He furrows his brows. Where is it coming from?

Rey.

He searches for her. Ben must temper the strength of his approach. If he seeks her immediately, she will not appreciate it. He must act patient.

 _I've got it!_ She assures with hurried confidence. _Look outside! I've got - !_

The connection severs with a crash. Ben shoots to his feet. The calm he had wrapped himself in is gone.

In two long strides he is at the window. The air leaves his entire body at what he sees.

Rey is on the rocks. The sand shark – Ben's eyes widen – is slithering hungrily toward her with its hundred tentacles.

 _Stupid girl!_ Ben races to the other side of his cell, draws up the Force like a battering ram, and charges.

He shatters what is surely a meter-thick wall of stone. Skidding down a steep ledge, he stops as soon as he can see the coast.

There is nothing. Both predator and prey are under the water.

"Hey! Solo!"

His guards have followed him, peering from the wall he punched through with their weapons drawn.

Distantly Ben can sense that his mother has been alerted.

"Stop what you're doing and - !"

"Be quiet!" Ben's concentration is shaky. He would have ignored the Resistance idiots but he cannot feel Rey…she is drowning…

He shoots out his left arm at the beach and holds his right arm to ward off the guards. He must get her out.

He finds her, levitating the wrestling sea-beast-out from the water, but no Rey. The sand shark….

It's swallowed her. It's swallowed her whole.

Ben is still as death for a moment. He cannot lose her. She cannot die. He would plunge himself headfirst into the sea below because he cannot endure…

At his break in concentration, the monster wriggles out of his grasp. Ben is unbelievably _murderous_ and he holds fast. He clenches his fingers like he's clawing the ugly giant fish out himself.

The dark-haired Jedi is sweating, intensely fraught with worry. He knows now what this is about. How stupid he has been to underestimate her willpower.

It takes every ounce of strength and every sinew of muscle to levitate the creature out of the water. He fears that as soon as he drops it on the sand it will bury itself deep, and the girl will be lost forever.

sssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss

When Rey prepares to jump in the water she has no idea if the sand shark could swim. Though she supposes it could somehow, if it could eat fish as big as the one Ben found for it. She would have practiced swimming more here if the sea wasn't infested with so many hungry creatures.

She hasn't been still enough to look at the damned predator fully. Now that it's completely exposed, she can see the dozens of wriggling tentacles crawling madly in her direction.

She knows Ben can see her, feel her. She can imagine he is pulling out his hair, eyes blazing like his old cross-guard lightsaber.

Gripping her lightsaber, she makes a running head start and arches her body for an ideal dive. As soon as she submerges, she kicks farther out, then turns and waits.

There was a shadow above, then it descended. Thousands of air bubbles exploded around the beast. It shrieked at her.

Rey has nowhere to go now.

In the fierce few seconds Rey lets herself imagine she is back facing Snoke: his eyes burning with furious triumph. The fear of drowning. The calm before the storm. The dip of surrendering before the killing blow.

Rey is alight with peace at this moment. She is not afraid.

 _Come and get me_ , she thought. _Come and get me, you ugly beastie, come on -!_

She braces herself, closing her eyes just as the sand shark opened its fearsome mouth. And surrenders.

sssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss

"Rey! Holy dammit, what's going on!"

Finn and Kivi rush ahead of Leia, who's cursing at them in a grizzly, I-was-married-to-Han-Solo manner.

Chewie reaches the beach before any of them. Finn shields his eyes and sees some ugly blob –

"Is that – is that the - !"

But then Ben Solo has made some swooping, graceful, batlike jump out of nowhere. He runs toward them from the other side of the beach.

There are shouts from the guards who were stationed at his cell. Finn's not even bothered. He won't say it to his face, ever, but he knows this guy's (relatively) harmless.

"Where's Rey!"

Ben doesn't respond, but his eyes are burning at the beached sand shark, which lies utterly still.

Leia skids down to the beach. "What's going on?" she shouts.

Finn jumps at the sharpness of her tone. He looks back at the creepy, massive dead animal. It's lying on its side, belly up. Something is poking, first small and almost unnoticeable. Then –

Pure light pierces out of the stomach. Guts and bile spit out, pouring and bubbling from the gaping wound. The familiar thrum makes Finn gape.

 _Is that a_ lightsaber?

More unnerving than a lightsaber emerging from the sand shark is Rey's slight, incredibly slimy figure. He at first thought it was an animal. But she is swiping the lightsaber in all directions, fighting her way out like she was buried in a grave.

He drops his blaster and hurries over to her. The smell briefly makes him falter.

"Oh – hell, Rey!"

She falls out. Finn drags her from under her arms first. He is barely of sound mind to reach for her lightsaber and shut it off.

"The hell? The hell is this?" He can't help shouting in disbelief. There's smelly fluid covering her face, so he wipes it off her mouth, her nostrils.

"Breathe, girl, come on," he says.

Rey is twisting around. Finn panics – he hasn't heard her breathe – and turns her on her back a little to try a blocked-airway maneuver.

But then there's a gasp and a cough. She tries to retch.

"Okay, that's it, that's it." Kivi and Chewie stand over them, unsure where to help.

"Can she stand?" Chewie asks.

Rey looks as helpless as a newborn youngling but she tries to kick her legs back into shape. "Yes," she says, nodding.

Finn holds his questions until he can hold her up to her feet. She's less shaky, but the sight of her is just ridiculous.

Behind them, Ben stands quietly. He has this intense look aimed at Rey, but Finn leaves it alone. Then the older man moves as if someone had spoken to him and removes his cape.

Finn turns Rey so her back faces Ben where he can wrap it around her. His movements are gentle, rubbing her back and tucking the cloth around her shoulders.

"I did it," Rey says suddenly. Flecks of goo stick to her eyelashes, but her eyes shine with awareness. She faces Ben as she says this. "I surrendered."

No one says a word. It takes them all, save for Ben and Rey, a minute to comprehend how the girl ended up in the stomach of a sand shark.

Ben's mouth hangs open. It's…almost funny to Finn how he's reduced to this. It's almost not right, too, how this guy could be so unstable, so out of control in his reactions. Like when he cut down an old man that first night on Jakku and when he tore apart walls and controls aboard the _Finalizer_.

Because right now he looks like he is holding a million words and thoughts back at Rey's triumphant grin.

Leia is flabbergasted. "Fucking Jedi," she mutters.


	26. Chapter 26

I need a Teacher

By TheOneAndOnlySlayer

Chapter 26 complete

They decide to have a campfire outside - because there's a big, dead, hulking… _succulent_ sand shark waiting to be gorged on.

It's borderline hysterical how good the thing tastes. Kivi has been laughing for an hour over how much money they could have made in one year if they sold it to some high-end fish restaurant.

He and Chewie hacked at the corpse like it was a tree, climbing on top of it and haphazardly chopping off pieces here and there.

Finn and Leia were just shaking their head in disbelief. Crazy. Fucking crazy, all of it.

"I wonder what Luke would say to this," he comments all of a sudden to the general. He knows that he can get away with saying her dead brother's name. It's a gift to see her smile wryly at him, too, like she's chiding him for his cheek. He could hug her now. But in truth she's scratched him by accident pretty badly when he hugged her, right when she sensed through the Force that Luke had died, so he won't take that liberty yet.

"Oh, boy," she says, shaking her head and giggling. "There was a time on Hoth that would have made him retch."

"Steaks are done!" Kivi calls out merrily. The sand shark lies there like a carved-out cornucopia. They've shoveled out the guts and thrown them into the ocean. They don't plan to eat _too_ close to a smelly corpse.

Chewie and Kivi carry plates of fish fillets to where the others are sitting. The two guards, Dester and Rovan, smoke their carefully rationed cigars together.

Finn looks around. "Where's Ben?"

Leia casts an eye over to the castle. "He's nearby. He's fine."

Finn nods, his stomach rumbling. It's all he needs to know.

sssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss

The only ones inside the castle are Rey, who is stubbornly trying to get the stench of sand shark intestine off her, and Ben. He's somewhere close, but he doesn't make his presence known. Rey leaves him alone. She's stripped down to her underclothes, and Leia offered a shawl for her to tie around her waist like a skirt.

"I tell you, if ever I needed convincing not to have done any Jedi training…" she had joked to Rey, who blushed and chortled uncontrollably. She's still giddy with what she's done.

There's a miserably small pot of desalinated water where she's washing her last amount of clean clothes. After the bath she took that afternoon, there's only a small amount of soap that definitely _won't_ take out the smell of fish out of the fabric.

She's trying not to give into hysterics. Lying nearby is Ben's black cloak; she won't look directly at it. He draped her with it earlier, and now it smells of her, and fish guts. The cloth is so warm and fine and she won't wrap herself in it until she's clean.

She inhales, instantly coughing at the stench that's sharp in her mouth. She's half-choking, half-laughing like an idiot when Ben finally decides to come in.

"Oh," he says. "Sorry, are you – all right?" He trains his eyes down at the ground. She's only clad in a breastband and sash around her hips. The sunset drapes everything in brilliant orange, and her legs and arms gleam from it.

"I'm – yeah," she mutters, still coughing. "I'm just – oh, kriff." She's plastered a hand over her mouth, pretty much giving up on the slimy cloth she's washed her legs and stomach with. "I just…I just bathed an hour ago, and now – I don't have any soap left!"

It's stupidly funny and pitiful at the same time. She smells so bad. Ben looks back at her with his big, dark eyes, and in an instant he ducks his face, shoulders giving away his laughter.

"You look extremely pathetic right now."

The way he says this, so flatly, makes her snigger and giggle all over again. It even makes him shudder just a bit, and when he laughs (it's not a hysterical belly laughter or anything), it makes him appear less stony.

"What the fuck were you thinking?" he asked in a lighter voice. " _'I'll just jump in a sand shark's mouth. That'll complete my Jedi training._ ' You…"

"I don't know. I wasn't really thinking; I don't think. We'll just say I was fishing."

That makes him throw his head skyward, shaking it in disbelief. His mane flares out just a bit, and Rey can see the pale curve of his ears.

"Oh, that makes perfect sense," he mocks her.

Rey groans and waves him off. "Fuck off. You're at least dry, y'bastard."

"You have my hood," he points out.

Turning awkwardly, Rey glances at it. "Yeah, well. I don't want to ruin it. 'S nice."

Ben debates for a moment, then strides over to where she's left the cloth. "I'll survive. You've already ruined it, so it's too late."

Rey steps back before she realizes what he's doing. Her heartbeat's gone up, to her irritation. He comes right up to her and extends his arms, wrapping the cloth around her shoulders. He actually brings the corners of it right by her collarbone in an attempt to tuck her under. His hands aren't even gloved as usual. They had always been since after the jump into the ocean.

 _He's too close again. Don't fidget, or he'll know something's wrong._

He acts like he's taking care of her, but before Rey can get carried away with this idea ( _No! You can't think these things_ ), his gesture slows, and he's heavy with his thoughts again.

"That was a very dangerous thing you did."

Rey sags. She's expected this. "The point of it was – "

"I know the point. I knew it the second I sensed you. You still should have told me."

It takes a moment to stuff away what he says. _Does he always sense her?_

On the other hand, she doesn't like how he chides her. Luke has never sounded so serious to Rey before. He's always been gentle yet firm. In Ben's voice there isn't a trace of cruelty or frustration, just very sobering concern.

"There's only two of us left, you understand? We can't…" he sighs, and just like that, with his eyes downcast (his eyelashes are just as long and glossy as his hair) he becomes something else.

Rey looks away, not wanting to misinterpret anything in her wild mind. "Okay. Okay, sorry, I…"

When she takes a deep breath, she is reminded of how…like last night, in a faraway world, it takes only this too-little distance for one of them to close in and…

It's unplanned, and Rey should have closed it out; off. But her nerves have been shot from the shock of today and he's very close, closer than before, and – she can't _think straight_ -

Her hands movee to grip the corners of the hood around her, brushing against hers. He starts, surprised at how cold they are. He moves to hold them both in his own, to warm them –

"Kriff, your hands are – "

And then it's too late. Rey should have calmed herself down, should have locked the images and sensations away, knowing that Ben's so Force-sensitive and more trained to pick up the slightest of things – a pin drop.

That stupid dream. She's done so well locking it deep, deep down somewhere so he couldn't stumble upon it in their training, (it didn't _mean_ anything) but since the night before Jess's death her mind's been pregnant with it. Her skin has prickled at the memory of it several times just today.

Rey observes, in horror and curiosity, how Ben's equally conflicted mind is struck with them all: _fast-moving images of the forest, their heated lightsaber strikes and something else itching deep between them. Her hazel eyes twinkling with knowledge that pours out with forbidden words, each echoing with her two, three steps, their lightsabers being pushed away, and her chest against his. Their heartbeats finally thrumming against each other. The hot breath between their mouths, too close…_

His eyes widen in alarm, curiosity, confusion and hurt. His mouth widens with no words being able to fit through. What is happening? What is this?

His breaths come out labored and pained. "Wha – "

" _Ben_. Wait, it's – it's not what you think – "

"You - ?"

"It's. It's nothing. I don't know what it is." Rey continues to grip the corners of the black cloth in her hands while trying to connect them to Ben's arms, which are guarded against her advances.

He's confused, protecting himself physically and mentally. Rey isn't sure why she feels disappointed, at fault. The way he shudders like she's a frozen entity, retreating from her and looking for the doorway.

Finally he explodes. "What the fuck _IS THAT_?"

His plain ire unnerves Rey, like she's actually hurt him. "I –I don't – know? It's…"

Force, she has nothing prepared for the panic in his eyes, his grim mouth.

"Are you – you can't honestly – "

"Look, I have no idea where that came from, it just did," Rey fights to explain. "Just let me – "

Predictably, Ben begins to pace. "I don't – I don't understand."

"Calm down, will you, it just – "

" _Are you out of your fucking mind?!"_ he exclaims. Screeches it, almost, like the beechpeckers that lose their voice.

Rey jumps. Actually jumps. There's pain and vulnerability in his voice that robs her of speech.

"How can you…"

Feeling more stupid under his electric eyes than tearing out of the stomach of a fish, covered in smelly stomach bile and fat, Rey tries _, tries_ to reassure him, to calm him. She doesn't know why…why is he so upset?

Deflated, Rey sets her eyes at the corner of a room so she doesn't have to see him leave. She can't explain why they're both rendered speechless.

The words were waiting to be spoken: _It doesn't mean anything._ They were waiting on the edge of Rey's lips. She doesn't know why she stopped, or why she feels sad.


	27. Chapter 27

I need a teacher

Chapter 27 complete

 _I'm not in love with him or anything._ This is what Rey has told herself for the past hour as she stares at the mossy ceiling of her sleeping area.

The air is stagnant with the smell of fish corpse. Leia and the others are keeping vigil over some transmission frequency. Finn's keeping her company, so Rey is alone. She's not sure if she would prefer it or not. That would be shit, wouldn't it: losing the woman you love, only to hear your best friend pondering about a _crush_ on your former enemy. She really isn't sure what is going on in her head, anyway.

She swallows. It is a crush. It's _something_. She is a woman and understands hot feelings for attractive people. Being around kind and attractive people like Poe and even Finn has done that to her. And she, more than anyone in the galaxy, perhaps more than his own mother, _gets_ him. Knows who, what he is. What he struggles to be.

They have been connected since the beginning. It sucks how it's turned to this, but Rey's tired of ignoring what's in front of her. Always of a practical mind, she needs to confront this. All of it.

Groaning, Rey sits up and folds her legs. No way is she getting any sleep tonight. Ben's look of hurt still flits in her mind and she doesn't know what it means. Why does she care? Isn't it in his character to just shrug it off and tell her she's stupid, a lovesick orphan, to have feelings for a Jedi whose power is (arguably) greater than hers?

It's just a kiss. She's never been kissed –

Well, false. She has been kissed, twice, but definitely, certainly _nothing_ like having a tongue in your mouth. Is that normal? She thought it was just lips pressed against each other.

Rey bows in frustration and runs her hands over her temples. A long time ago she hadn't a clue what the word 'kiss' meant. How blummin' silly. Now she's tempted to march into Ben's cell, squish her face against his and go, 'you're scared of _that_?'

Taking a deep breath, Rey sorts out the mess:

Why it's foolish and stupid and can't work, _ever_ : He's killed Jedi learners. Dozens of them at his own hand, perhaps. Hundreds of them because he planned it.

He's been on a campaign of killing and torture for years. He's tortured Poe, her friend.

He betrayed his family: A father whose crime was, okay, occasional abandonment; a mother who had to be mother to a broken galaxy; an uncle who was the only one who could help him with the Force.

He's sworn to kill herself. His obsession with her since their first encounter on Takodana bordered on a sickness she could sense light-years away.

It hurts to think these things. It feels like betrayal. It has to be done; she's thinking over why it would be okay to kiss him in real life, when he's got blood and the dust of incinerated planets stained to his skin.

But:

He's changed. He's actually renounced. The faintest believer who would scoff at the idea of one just waking up and going, "I think I'm going to be good from now on," would have no choice but to believe it in Ben.

He's helped Rey in her training. Actually helped. He could have abused this chance and been a complete asshole, but he's honestly tried. Rey's just been the idiot who couldn't move past his sins and her own emerging insecurity.

They are the only two Jedi left. They may as well be more connected.

The Jedi are not meant to have attachments. There is no emotion, no passion. These are two things Rey believes have been part of her rebirth in this world outside of Jakku, and yet the Jedi Code points these things out as feeding the appetite of the Sith.

She's not looking for a sort of companionship like Finn and Jess had. Has Ben ever even kissed anyone? Probably not. She won't dare imagine the last time he's touched anyone outside of violent intentions. Who wasn't her…

 _Maybe I feel something for him. Maybe it's…maybe it's not love. Maybe it could never be_. Her thoughts are as clear as rain. _All I know is…I need him. And he needs me._

Sssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss

Above, a voice seeps through, like the cold: _Now. You see? It was all for nothing. She could never trust you. It was never about your return to the Light. Never about your kindness, your compassion. It means nothing to her. She is as basic in her instincts as an animal._

 _You are even more misled than ever, Ben Solo._

 _Do it. Do it – sink it in further. Let them find you here. Let them move on without you._

Sssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss

Two hours later Rey wakes with a start. There is a heavy blow at her side, melting hot blood out from her.

It's not hers, she realizes.

Stumbling out of the room, she goes up, up to where the other Force-sensitive idiot sleeps.

This is fear, trailing down her back, clawing at her shoulders and heart as she rushes faster than the wind. It has helped her survive, true, but it makes her fear the worst.

Snoke would have incinerated her with her rapid thoughts: _What has he done what has he done what's wrong if he's killed himself –_

Sssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss

Somewhere, in a dark, smoking corner of the galaxy, Snoke sighs in contentment.

Ssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss

At the entrance to his cell, there's a wall like there is no room beyond it. It's a mental shield, an illusion to fool the simplest of minds. For a moment the younger Jedi marvels at his skill, but then realizes he's definitely wounded over there and she can't reach him. She opens herself to the shield, showing she means no harm.

"Let me in, damn you!"

Like a mirage it fades. She rushes inside and sees him. Shirtless. Writhing on the ground, ink-dark blood smearing his side.

He's staring, wide-eyed in his delirium, at something in the corner. Someone.

This…it's not a mirage. Though it should be: it's Ben – _Kylo Ren_ , in his mask and full robes.

The monster that Ben used to be is knelt on the floor, but at Rey's presence, he rises like a spider-cat into the shadows.

Rey has no time to watch the thing disappear and leap at her. She can't let this demon fell them both. She sinks to the ground, to Ben.

"You…" Is he dying? She's afraid to touch him, yet her hands jump from his chest to his face. "What happened?"

 _Scavenger._

It's like when she found Finn with his torn back in the snow. She can't think and there's a thick cloud blinding her with panic.

But as soon as that deep, damned voice calls her, whether it's this alter ego or the deformed master himself, she's sharpened.

Grimacing, she looks up.

 _It's too late for him,_ it says in that mechanical voice _. He is too weak for you._

Beneath her, Ben shudders.

Rey's grip on the man tightens. "No." Her voice is fire and steel, a lightsaber itself. "You're not real."

 _I am real enough for him. I have never left him._

Ignoring the heavy, mechanized tone from the ghost, Rey makes herself look at the wound. She is stunned to see a thin, bloody stiletto knife inches from his hand.

The kriff? Did he do this himself?

Ben's eyes are glazed over, and to her dismay his Adam's apple bobs frantically.

He's choking.

 _Still a boy after all this time,_ the shape of Kylo Ren muses.

What can she stop first, the bleeding or his blocked airway? How is a ghost doing this? How can she see him? Force-ghosts only come from the Light side of the Force, not the Dark.

Laying his head on her knelt legs, Rey leans over and spreads one hand on the wound. She's experienced enough in rapid healing, but she's had little time to practice on something as serious as this.

Her other hand lies ready at her side if this apparition comes any closer. "Go back to where you came from," she swears in a low breath.

 _You cannot protect him. He is weak. He trembles from you. Let him rot here._

Kylo Ren's hand flexes. When Rey looks back down, her eyes widen at the form of a child, an adolescent no older than eleven or twelve. It's Ben, down from the hair to the somber features and the complex, too-old eyes.

He appears more open in his anguish. Those eyes look beyond Rey. "I can always hear them screaming. I can't…I'm so tired."

Oh. This is the Ben Solo who's been hiding, trying to be in one whole piece in front of all of them. This is the real Ben Solo in this terrible room, alone to fight the demon in the dark. To see a true image of him surrendering so….

Something great and intense rises from her. "No. You can't have him."

Kylo Ren does not budge.

"You. Can't. Take him. He's mine," she swears, holding the near-unconscious man closer to her. "He's mine! He is not yours anymore. Go!"

She's lifted a hundred-foot wave at the beach _by accident_. She's thrown several-ton boulders a half-mile into the ocean. She can banish a _ghost_.

She throws the Force out at it like a light that burns. Too quickly, it extinguishes, mask and all, in a snap.

Rey looks down. Ben's grabbed one of her wrists, either because he's pissed she's there or he's reminding her he's still alive. Or won't be for much longer.

 _Fucking, fucking_ – she bites out in her mind, long enough for him to hear her.

"Ju – hold still," she tells him in a shaky voice. Pulling her power back, she calms it until its soothing as water, a melted stream in the break of spring. She inhales, feeling shaky at all the blood that keeps leaking out.

Back on Krakkauer, the mining planet with the dam and communications center, she knelt just like this with a blonde, baby-faced boy in the same First Order petty officer's uniform she had worn as a spy. He choked on his own blood and pleaded for his mother. Rey couldn't save him because the lower half of his body lay several feet away from him.

 _Put that thought away, NOW. Ben is not going to die here, all right?_

She bites her tongue, angry at the tears that blur her vision. She concentrates as hard as she can as she lets the Force flow into Ben, feeling his life pulse erratically around the wound. She slows him; the bleeding, his breath and thoughts. In another minute he's unconscious.

It's better this way, Rey realizes, as she fights to seal the wound. Being so close to him, she can see others along his sides. They are very blatant. She would have seen them from two nights ago, when they were practicing lightsaber combat and he took his shirt off. He must have hidden them. _Bastard_ _coward_!

She _won't_ think of how she's finally close enough to touch his hair, which fans out against her legs while she struggles to heal him. Nor will she think of why there's a knife stained with Ben's blood, inches away from his equally bloody hand.

She works through the night, this large, strong-bodied, erratically tempered man sprawled against her. She can feel every cell of him, stitching his skin together, working like a weaver to conjoin flesh and sinew back.

She goes in so deep that it's like she's dived into the water on their second day of lessons. It's disorienting and dark, but there's a calm quiet as she works. His…his Force is her Force.

When she's mostly finished, she's sweating and exhausted. Her throat's parched. Maybe she should have called for help, to embarrass the living shit out of him, but she hadn't even thought to yell down the hall for anyone.

It doesn't matter. Once he wakes up, she's gonna kill him.


	28. Chapter 28

I need a teacher

Chapter 28 complete

The hard cold floor in his back is the first thing Ben feels. When he shifts, biting away the pain he knows should be coming from his side, he notices his head and shoulders are elevated.

Warm flesh acts as a cushion. Someone's found him. He absorbs this in a flash. Was it his mother? He was so _careful_ –

No. No, it's _Rey_.

The low, barely-there hum of her meditation breaks. Her amber eyes open steadily and find his. Blinking, Ben swiftly rises to a sitting position away from her, offering him nothing but his back.

He feels new flesh mended along his side. The knife has been cast aside in distaste. So she found him. With him; the other. Kylo.

He feels nothing: no humiliation or outrage. He is ice and stone.

It's useless, though. She sees right through him now, more exposed and torn than she was last night on the beach, weeping and in hysterics.

Flashes of the nightmare return. The sound of his former self, of the monster he used to be (and still is. He will not try to deny it) rang so clearly in his head that he couldn't fight it. He was too tired, had finally given up. He had felt so worthless, thrown: over the image if a kiss.

It was so sweet and perfect and good that he felt it was a burn, a punishment being shown something he didn't deserve.

And so, the knife had sunk a little too far. Not what he meant at all.

Control. He has to get it back. Rey is still behind him, waiting for an explanation.

He won't give her one. Instead he decides to make her back off.

He touches the barely scarred flesh with partial reverence. His words, however, are careless. "You're getting reckless. Although your healing abilities are impressive. I never would have suspected you were capable of so much concentration, considering what you showed me earlier this evening. That was inappropriate on the highest level –"

Rey doesn't think; she smacks him, hard, on the back of his head. How dare he speak to her in that mechanized tone like his old mask? Like she hadn't felt panic at seeing him die.

"Fuck you," she hisses. "What the fuck is your problem? Did you try and kill yourself?"

"Do NOT come any closer," he warns her in a pained voice.

Rey stares at the bloodied hand meant to hold her back, and settles back on the floor.

"You really enjoy hurting the people who care about you." She thinks of Leia as she says this.

So does Ben. He turns to face her, staring her down. His scar flexes to reflect his strain. Rey, however, counts the beauty marks on his face.

"Is that what this is? You care about me?" He sneers. This is Ben solo, too; not just a scared little boy, but a hissing, hurt predator bent on the offensive.

Rey's not intimidated. "Is that so wrong?" she asks softly. Even softer: "…Don't you care about me?"

What a weak thing to say. Ben schools his features, ignoring the soft churning in his belly. "You're the last Jedi. Your mission is to destroy Snoke. You are more valuable than the entire Resistance."

"If that was me bleeding on the floor like a stupid idiot that you are, would you be upset? Would you cry and hope to some God that I wouldn't die in your arms? Huh?"

Ben cannot answer, momentarily baffled.

She leans forward, emotions hot like a sun. "You don't get to die."

"I had no intention of dying," he points out flatly.

"So you got clumsy and that knife just slipped into your stupid stomach?" Her accent, even when she's angry mocking him, sounds elegant. "Did you cut yourself shaving down there?"

"Why do you care so much?" He returns to the main point. He is fixated on hearing the truth from her. Whatever his shadow of Kylo Ren said, Rey's answer will be more truthful.

"Why? Tell me," he demands.

The sharpness fades from her. Her eyes still blaze. "I don't know. I just do, I guess. It just happened."

He is definitely unsatisfied with this. "Don't fool yourself, scavenger." He calls her that with some degree of satisfaction because he hasn't called her that in almost a year. He has to cut this out before she latches into this, whatever this is, too. "You forget. What I am. You would not bed a monster. I know you."

Rey's mouth drops. "Who said anything about bedding, you numbfuck? Kriff!" she curses the ceiling, exasperated. "You are such a coward! What are you so afraid of? You were dying, so why are you making me feel bad?"

Ben's jaw is clenched so tight that it aches. He looks away from this girl, this chit who won't leave him alone. Even in the silence he can hear her blood rushing in her veins, feel the sweat and hair along her neck.

His head is swimming in distractions. Fatigue threatens to put him asleep where he sits. "It's wrong, Rey. You can't…" he doesn't know how to finish the sentence. It would reveal too much. "You _can't."_

He can't see her but he feels her betrayal, embarrassment. He knows she's looked over at the knife and what it means. As her guilt emerges, Ben wonders, how…how can she want _him_?

"I…" she starts, clearing her throat. "If it wasn't for that…you wouldn't be here with us."

She means here, unbound like a prisoner of war should be. She means letting him in, strengthening her in the ways of the Force.

It really shouldn't be this way. It should not have been so easy, meeting every morning on the beach and discussing memory techniques. Instructing her, with their little touches and soothing comments, faces that aren't locked in uncompromising hatred.

If it's any more possible, he withdraws. His legs shake as he stands up and goes to the punched-out wall where the salty air washes his thoughts away.

"Get some rest."

Rey ignores the dismissal. "Where are the other knives?"

Ben closes his eyes at the scraping sound when she picks up the bloody one. "My clothes. Over there."

He hears the whoosh of an ignited lightsaber and turns in surprise. She's holding Uncle Luke's saber and the bloody stiletto. "Destroy these. Now."

Steely eyes reflect cold blue from the sword. He is so tall and strong, skin as pale and bright as the lightsaber that Rey blinks at the combined brilliance. Which he, of course, notices now.

He approaches and takes both, fingers curling away as they brush against hers. He holds the stiletto, the torture device he's kept close like a talisman, and watches it incinerate into dust without so much as a spark.

He had expected something a little dramatic and foreboding, but nothing came. It was just a dull knife.

She makes him do the same with all the others. Her eyes glow with irritation, but they are trained to look beyond him, away from his body.

If he wasn't so disgusted with himself he'd appreciate the chance to torment her a little.

When they're finished Rey deactivates the lightsaber and tosses it back to him. "Am I supposed to say you're on suicide watch now?"

Ben half-expected her to not talk about what happened earlier. He frowns. "If I can avoid the humiliation of someone discovering me again, no."

"How do I know," she asks, then falters. "That…that vision. The other…Kylo Ren. Do we have to worry about it?"

Ben looks within himself, of the shadow that had not quite left him on the day he left the First Order. He doesn't think he's completely through vanquishing its presence from himself. He doesn't feel the trace of his old master tethered to him, even faintly. They're still safe for now.

When he explains this to her, the glare in her eyes lessens. She sighs, showing just how tired she is. He feels angry at himself for making her so…concerned for him. He doesn't deserve it.

"Okay. I'm going back to bed." He can feel her shudder just a little at the word "bed," thinking of how he used it earlier. "Try not to fall on anything sharp by accident again, will you?"

Sssssssssssssssssssssssssssss

When Rey leaves Ben to himself and trudges back to her room, she feels a fluttering ache in her chest, and on her thighs where Ben's head rested on. Her hands tingle and itch, and it's not really from the use of her healing abilities.

It's like a high. The way his hair felt like satin, which is rather stupid considering he's a man and all. And his skin…

She touched him. His stomach. It – he – was a mixture of fever and the chill of water.

And he way his body – inside, his great lungs and sinew, his organs – strong and massive like a cathedral as she familiarized herself with his physique to heal him.

The sudden familiarity, the sensation of his blood rushing around her, has not left her. He's tattooed all over her now.

No meditation will help her sleep now. She needs –

Chewie! Oh, hells, she knows he's got some brandy on him. Left, hopefully.

She flits down the stairs and past the slumbering soldiers who aren't on duty. Two officers keep vigil over their communication system by two small fires. Chewie's been sleeping in the freighter, where he insists Leia remain if she sleeps. He's the last one to still disagree on Ben's freedom of movement alongside them.

When Rey marches up the ramp, his hulking brown form blocks her. "What are you doing here?"

Rey blinks and tries not to think of what that Wookie's nose can pick up. She actually stubs her toe in the ground. "I…need a drink. Alright."

His stiff posture begins to bend in consideration, which is enough for the irritated Jedi to shrug past him and look for his alcohol. Chewie doesn't have a drinking problem, exactly, but Rey's caught him acting reclusive and clutching a bottle of Corellian brandy from beneath his wet whiskers. She's assumed, by not berating him too much about his choice of mourning, that he'll return the favor somehow by letting her have some now.


	29. Chapter 29

I need a Teacher

Chapter 29 complete

There's no hangover from last night, thank the Force. Rey's not an expert in drinking (yet) so luckily the one cup of spicy-sweet brandy did the trick to put her mind off snowy skin and long hair.

When she wakes up, stretching her hands up to the low ceiling of the freighter, Chewie bangs impatiently against the metal wall. "Come on. Leia's having a funeral."

That made Rey turn. "What?"

"For Luke. And the pilot girl. Up on the ridge."

Hearing her Jedi master's name makes her heart deflate a little. This melancholy seems to hit the hardest in the early parts of the morning. Having a funeral would let that weight last the whole day. Luke wouldn't want their little band of rebels to fuss about remembering him.

Anakin was definitely right in that, since they arrived on this secret planet to recover from their escape, Rey's stubbornly maintained a level of optimism. Eventually she choked on it, unable to ignore the grief and the failure, and doubt. And Jess. And Finn.

Luke would have made everything easier. Maybe if he were here, Rey would not have fallen into this trap of confusing feelings for Ben.

She casts her eyes over to the silver and pale gold morning. It is a beautiful day, with the decayed castle over the towering coast. For a man born in the desert and spent exile, and will be put to rest, at sea, she realizes Luke's life was full of unexpected turns like a story. Rey has inherited that life now. She was his age, and Leia's, when the two unsuspecting siblings and Han Solo all came together and saved the galaxy. How unbelievably dashing, all of it. Now it's something she, Finn and Poe have fallen into. It's their story now. Theirs, and Ben's.

Rey closes her eyes as she breathes in the full salt air. She makes herself remember the last moments between her and the elder Skywalker. Her friend.

Sssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss

1 week ago:

 _The halls are enormously grand and dark. As soon as she and Luke enter the cavernous palace of the Sith, Rey feels like she's descending into a treasure trove full of ghosts and dragons. There seems to be something echoing deep underground._

" _That's the purity of the Dark Side," Luke explains hurriedly. "He's close. They both are."_

 _Rey goes over their terribly last-second plan to get Ben back, to reclaim him and give Snoke a kick in the balls of some kind. They've radioed Leia and a few others on their plan – a diversion's been cast to allow the two Jedi to sneak through. They're dressed in dark clothes. Luke's grey robes are traded in for a slim tunic and pants, like he used to wear in his prime. Grizzled and suddenly determined, he looks more ferocious than ever._

 _Then, there, like the careless sense of a dream, ahead of them is their target. Kylo Ren._

 _Ben. Ben Solo. Rey has to remind herself that is his name from now on._

 _He is the only black-clad figure close by. He is unmasked. Wandering, almost. Rey analyses his movement; it's uncalculated, which is not part of his character._

 _When he does see them, he looks very shocked. He hasn't sensed them, even from here? What's wrong with him?_

" _Ben."_

 _The open emotion in Luke's voice makes Rey think of how Han, this misled killer's father, roared his name. Rey suddenly feels like this is another trap she is forced to witness all over again._

 _Her hand will not go to her lightsaber. She has to trust this. More than in the whole time she has known this man, as legend whittled down to haunted man, Luke had burned with a newborn confidence that the key to penetrating the Dark Side was to reclaim Ben one final time. Rey has to believe he will come to them._

 _The man, Kylo/Ben, ends his starry-eyed gaze and looks skyward. "I'm dreaming this."_

 _That answer sounds so weak that it's enough for Luke to stride over to his nephew._

 _Rey wants to watch. There's been nothing but bloodshed the past few months. But, before she realizes what's wrong, like the change of temperature, something floods into her mind._

 _She doesn't see the last few Knights of Ren come at Luke, even though their noble leader Kylo Ren is arrested at the Jedis' arrival. They don't approach her, either:_

 _Snoke's taken care of that._

 _It's his voice, his breath roiling into her. She turns, seduced by the shadow of his calling._

My dear. You are so strong. So bright.

 _It is so easy how she abandons her master to that sound._

 _She doesn't know how far she walks, only that she approaches a closed-off chamber. The walls are lined with statues of grotesque, open-mouthed faces. There is a narrow walkway, like a bridge, leading up to an altar of some kind. On each side of the walkway is open space that descends deep to Force knows where. There is no other way out._

 _There, blending into the stone, is a wretched, ancient creature with a chunk of flesh missing from his face. He doesn't look scary, just unfortunate._

" _Look at you," he lows. "So sweet. So kind and bright. You look ready. Ripe."_

 _It's cold here, but something in the air makes her feel heady, less sharp. Ripe? "For what?" and even here she sounds sluggish._

 _He's in front of her with his lightsaber – two of them, shit! - before she can step back. A skeleton with sagging skin will never look the same to Rey again as this ugly thing erupts into movement. Though she's mended a second lightsaber to connect with her first one, a rendition of her old quarterstaff, she's unable to keep up, purely on the defense._

 _Inside, Rey is cursing her stupidity. She should have sensed one of the Sith would lay a trap._

" _He speaks so highly of you," he croons, like wax; a sticky-hot sensation. "Thinks more of you, when he thinks I can't tell. As if you are his sun and moon – !"_

 _Desperately parrying his blows now, Rey finds it impossible to escape this. She can barely concentrate to call for Luke's help._

 _The way this creature's eyes boil in hunger make Rey fight all the harder. There's a space of time as he circles her. Rey doesn't give him the idea that she's just prey. She squares her own deadly gaze at this prick. "Jealous that you're not the center of his attention anymore?"_

" _No. I am grateful," he purrs instead. "If it hadn't been for the boy's sniveling obsession with you, I would never have known – "_

 _Rey dives in, unable to stand his croaking. Her double-bladed saber whirls like an electron, warding him off._

 _But this creature is beyond her intellect, already calculating her next moves. "If only I knew you were out there. Alone in the desert. Waiting to be plucked. You excel where he slows, you know. A killer in the making."_

 _The next thing that happens is just unnatural, and yet exactly what Rey could have suspected from such an elusive being. He just disappears. His two lightsabers, too, his glowing eyes – all of him, gone like smoke._

 _Only his voice remains, rattling the woman to her core. "You are perfect."_

 _Perfect. Oh._

 _He's not fighting her. He's not defending his territory or showing her who's boss. He's testing her._

 _It's not a trap. It's an audition._

 _Her vision blurs, and it's like shadows close in on her. Her lightsaber is not bright enough. Turning around, suddenly on edge, Rey stretches out her senses, feeling for a disturbance. He's nowhere._

 _Something cuts through the dark, heavy and close. It's one-half of those face statues pulled out unevenly from the wall. She jumps out of the way, lashing at it with her saber. More come at her, evading each other neatly but all coming straight at her. Rey's strong, but her arms protest at the lightsaber having to cut through so much stone._

 _It's too much effort to summon the Force, but she tries anyway. She suspects he's done something to suck it away from her, like she can't even have any to herself._

 _Kriff it. She snaps one-half of her double blade away and deactivates the other half. Her one hand free now, she angles it in front of her like a shield, drawing the Force back to her._

" _Come on out. Y'bastard!"_

 _He does, calm as a mystic. His lightsabers are gone. Maybe it's an illusion? Rey quirks her head, trying to look for a fault –_

 _A crackle of something blue and alive flies at her. Luke's told her about this – Force lightning._

 _It encases her like a spider, crawling over her body rapidly, making her writhe in more pain than she can imagine in such a short amount of seconds. It dissipates, leaving Rey breathless and shaking._

 _When she can breathe again, it sucks out of her in a vacuum, a gasp to voice her pain._

 _Snoke stands above her. His face is like death shrouded in a grave. Rey recoils and backs away, but everything_ hurts.

 _There's no way of knowing what his next move will be. Closing her eyes, she draws whatever Light is left._

 _It's so dark. She used to hate the dark, but long ago. Why is she suddenly scared of it now?_

 _The Force returns, forming a sphere-like shield until a BAM! Snoke's battering ram through the Force throws her off-balance. It's coupled with Force-lightning, and Rey almost passes out. She doesn't know, but she is falling off the bridge and down into the gap below._

 _Just as she comes to, she feels the air fly past her, knowing she's about to be splattered by gravity. She tumbles ungracefully on her hands and knees, coughing._

Luke. LUKE!

 _Her lightsaber is out of her hands. It's hovering around her in the dark, swiping at her dangerously, mocking her, then whipping around like a propeller. It kicks up dust form the dirt floor. Disoriented, Rey focuses with the knowledge that she'll die if she doesn't, and bumps into Snoke –_

 _He was behind her all this time. He lifts one hand and holds her up in the air, studying her._

 _In all this, the thin creep stares at her like he's got the one emotion in his half-ripped face._

 _Her eyes gleam in defiance. He hasn't beaten her yet. "You don't scare me."_

 _Rey fights in his grip, but then her throat closes in. He's choking her. Then he comes closer. Rey feels utterly faint, but she watches with a touch of curiosity as he lifts a finger. Just one, right at her temple._

 _She would have flinched at the way he brushed away a lock of her hair, like he dared to think of her as a lover. If she had freedom of movement she would have head-but him for that touch._

 _But it's the last thing she sees of him. The rest – something more painful, more agonizing than Force-lightning, than pain itself._

 _That's where the nightmares start. She screams._

Ssssssssssssssssss

Back on the freighter, Rey clenches her fists and kicks the wall with a stubborn flourish.

Luke Skywalker is dead. Dead, dead, because she abandoned him for Snoke's little test. She screwed up the whole mission. If she hadn't been so weak-willed –

 _Damn you; damn you!_ She thinks. A bright flare of anger warms her a little. It's not a good sign, and the young Jedi shakes her head and calls out immaturity.

She remembers the purring jeer and lull in Snoke's voice, his words: Ripe. Perfect. Waiting. It disgusts and, frighteningly, intrigues her. Snoke really thought she could be Sith material.

Snoke was more accepting of Rey's potential than Luke. But Rey must remind herself: she stayed with planted feet by Luke's side, desiring nothing more than the calm music of the Light.

And Luke had seen it in her, too. He had softened at her attempt to show promise, meditating near him every morning, making sure she sat still for hours trying to mimic his draw of the Force. She cleared her mind every evening and let them drift around her for Luke to see – even though she knew he would never have admitted it.

It was about a week until he finally, thankfully, invited her to join him for a breathing exercise. Then things progressed to casual remarks about her quarterstaff, then to gently challenging how she managed her first lightsaber duel. Then to "some pointers," her and there, to improve her fighting style.

In the end, she suspects they needed to prove something to each other. They were never really master and apprentice, anyways.

She's fought this far. Luke…he died fighting. Though Ben is still not out of the Dark, he's in their care. Her care. Even though she makes for a shit nurse.

They both know what hides in the dark, howling for them. They won't relent.

 _You'll get him. Just need more time._


	30. Chapter 30

I need a teacher

Chapter 30 the funeral

It isn't until the afternoon that the Resistance group gathers atop the ridge, where the air is a clean breeze and the beechpeckers loom overhead. As their little group trudges up, Leia is crouched over a little firepit she must have fashioned herself. It strikes Rey, and possibly the others, that though her leadership is highly valued among her peers and subordinates, her ability to adapt is another talent. Perhaps it's the idea that this hardy general lady used to be a princess in finery that makes Rey shake her head in disbelief, as the middle-aged woman expertly stokes the fire. A princess who married a thief: there's no telling exactly what else Han Solo's taught her.

Chewbacca stands over her, holding his bowcaster and gazing out into the ocean. As Rey approaches, she swallows. She heard Kivi say that Ben was expected to attend. Based on how Chewie's surly, threatening mood hasn't changed, she wonders if it's safe for the two to be so close.

Surprisingly, it's Finn who brings Ben along. She sees his black form from the corner of her eye and stops breathing, needing all the effort to train her mind into undisturbed serenity. He'll probably be paranoid of images of them kissing that Ben might instinctively probe her mind. Although he might not. They are at a damn funeral.

Leia waits for the last of their party to arrive before standing. "Thanks for coming, everyone. I think it's been overdue, this memorial service. This…Well, I've done this sort of thing before, and it's never easy, but this is probably the most…pitiful."

Several of the pilots and technicians snicker at Leia's word choice. Leia's eyes brighten a bit, too, even after her grin falters. "If Luke…if we had his body, it wouldn't feel right to bury him here; on a place I'll probably never visit again. We're…we're at our worst right now. We've been on this damn rock for seven wasteful days trying to recover, and I sometimes forget what I'm fighting for. We've all lost someone close."

As if on cue, Rey and Finn share a look. Through their time in the Resistance, they've heard and seen this woman make condemning speeches against the First Order or soothing condolences to the fallen. This is pretty different. There's no smooth rehearsal, obviously, but Leia still looks terrible in front of her audience. Even in ugly slacks and a commander's vest, she was still…cool.

"I wish…I wish we could all just hide and never leave this place." Leia shakes her head. "It's cowardly, but this life has given me too many pains. My brother…before I became a wife, and a mother, I think Iearning that I had a brother was one of the best moments of real, true happiness in my life. I wasn't just happy, I was grounded in purpose to live. And now…even the war has taken that as well.

"But I don't want to lament this whole time – this is about remembering Luke. He didn't live like me. He was safe and isolated in a pocket of a planet where there was no war, no demands in his young life. Before I knew who he was, I envied him. I hated how easily he took to the cause 30 years ago, how I had fought my whole life with my adopted father, and he just…took it all like trying on a new shirt. He had so much hope, always. He was truly exceptional."

Annoyance and the reluctance to cry tear through her voice. For one horrible instant everyone unconsciously anticipates the great lady to weep. But Leia is a damn commander. _They_ are the unsteadily emotional ones, afraid of the middle-aged woman.

Hiding another snicker at the absurd thought, Rey bends her head at the ground. She and a handful have been lucky to see Leia's playful, humorously irritated side as the famed Jedi's sister. Right now Leia's voice sounds like the remnant of "it's not fair he got to die first."

Oh. Oh, if only he were here. Not even for advice. Just to be here with his calm-as-water smile and those impossibly blue eyes.

Rey won't quite agree that he was always hopeful. Upon first discovering him on Ach-to, she was the annoyingly optimistic one, and Luke the broken soul. In the end, though, she supposed rescuing Ben brought all that back in to that suddenly youthful man. He had been silvered and hopeless, unwilling to be dragged back to the eternal fight of good and evil by a scrap of a girl.

It apparently bears repeating with Ben, whose gazed remains politely downcast. His head swims in the last memory of his Uncle, the one man, he supposes, who really understood him.

ssssssssssssssssssssssss

 _A week ago,_ _several Ren Knights lay dead at Luke Skywalker's feet. The younger man has not even frowned an inch at them. These are Luke's kills because the strikes are aimed quickly without a trace of suffering._

 _Luke feels more assured of Ben's usually expressive face than in the lack of protest against his fallen brethren. Luke could fall to his knees right now. It may have been 15 years since he saw this boy's face, but Force, it's the same. His eyes were once so kind and searching, and he sees his brother-in-law Han's nose and mouth on this older stranger, too. He knows Ben is inside, feels it._

" _Ben. My boy. You brave man. Look at me. Look – "_

 _The Force; Rey is in trouble. It sings a rapid hum in his bones. He turns, looking deep into the dark hallway she disappeared into. So does his nephew, who is poised like an animal, not sure if it should fight or flee._

 _Luke turns to Ben. "S-Snoke must have got her. We must help her, Ben."_

 _The man doesn't move._

 _Luke's voice has abandoned all complacency and becomes urgent. "She is out there with Snoke. He'll kill her."_

 _In his nephew's face, at the mention of the young woman who has changed Luke's life (and Ben's, he suspects), the fallen Jedi looks torn. "I don't care," he finally says._

 _That makes Luke smarten in anger. He comes over and tightens his hand on the back of Ben's neck, drawing him close. There is no rage emanating from the younger man, just a buzzing of confusion and conflicted hope._

" _That's not true and you know it. You are covered in her. You plaster yourself to her soul and you tell yourself you're not waiting for her to drag you into the Light. You selfish man! She will die out there with your so-called master!"_

 _Ben Solo is at first shocked at Luke's burning blue eyes. Now he no longer doubts his uncle, whom he claimed as weak, is Anakin Skywalker's son. But his own eyes become glazed over at the corridor where Rey challenges his master._

" _She…" he whispers in disbelief._

" _She needs you, Ben – help her! He's going to kill her. We have to save her!"_

 _It's like calming a gualaar, the way his grown nephew breathes in and out, shrugging away his uncle's grip on his arms. They tear through the hall to the hidden chamber and the half-broken bridge. Finding it empty, Ben looks down. Luke won't comment on the breach of possessiveness coming from his grown relative, instead focusing on the form of his fallen padawan, unconscious._

 _After a beat Ben holds out a hand and curls it in, lifting the girl up from the ground. Luke pulls her hand and cups his arms to hold her._

 _Ben's gloved hand goes to her head, then recoils. His eyes shine with realization. "He's - !"_

" _Get us to the ground," the master orders him. "We're leaving."_

 _Though he hasn't allowed a link between him and his nephew in fifteen years, Luke lets it flood now. His emotions are enough to signal that they are not alone, and at least two of them have to flee. Rey is clearly out of it, and Ben is in no shape to face his master._

 _The master in question drifts in like a cloud, silent and shrouded. Ben almost buckles, both at the sight of Snoke and at Rey's weight as Luke unceremoniously passes her over._

 _Luke's not afraid. He's seen this coming. It's why he hasn't hesitated in the plan to get his nephew and apprentice back. He knows it's worth it. As long as she makes it out alive. "Run, Ben - go!"_

 _Ben opens up to the renewed link with equal familiarity and necessity. When he casts a hastened look of dread his uncles' way, it's as if he hasn't aged from boy to man._

He's my master _– his voice is thick with warning, of honest fear_

I'll deal with him _, his uncle tells him. The bearded, blue-eyed face is so soft and kind that it hurts Ben to look. This was Luke's mess all along. He is here to reclaim it._

 _Luke watches the resigned sadness on the boy's face, then the solid shield of determination return like his old mask. Ben leaves him, Rey tightly in his arms, retreating. Returning home._

 _That's when Luke faces Snoke. "Force, you guys keep getting uglier."_

 _Ssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss_

Over a week later, Ben opens his eyes.

His mother has now given space for Finn to speak. The dark skinned man has his arms crossed over the elbows and his face is the most solemn of them all. He is saying goodbye to his dead love.

"I never…" he struggles. "I never thought…I was happy. Really happy. I'm 24 years old and…in one year I felt more human than any other time. Jess was one of those reasons. A big reason. Not just for…you know. Stuff. I mean – Oh, Kriff, hang on," he choked in half-laughter, half sorrow, for the others began to snigger at his mistake. "Sorry Jess, that was stupid."

Saying her name twice is apparently too much for the man. He's six years younger than Ben. Ben hadn't been able to discern the age exactly. Now, his face crumbles like a boy's.

And of course, this is when Rey comes up to him. Like Krayt pups, the two of them; always nearby when the other was hurting. Under his heavy brows he watches as the woman bends her head at his cowed one, rests a gentle hand on his shoulder, then her head once Finn welcomes her.

Ben shifts and crosses his arms.

His mother looks forlorn at the young man. Death, to the young, is like a brand new wound. In contrast, her withered expression makes her look so alien that it worries Ben a little.

From the back, the tall joker, Kivi, clears his throat. "I'd like to – um, ma'am, I'd like to say a few words, if that's okay."

Leia wasn't expecting this. There's a thread of unease that Ben detects. "Go ahead, Kivi."

The mechanic bends his head in respect ( _it's a_ fire, Ben supplants distastefully) and frowns. "I met Jess once at a party once. She was cool. Way out of my league, apparently. Luke – I mean, Master Skywalker – he, that was…whoa. I pretended to be him when I was a kid. It was so weird. But – you know, in, like, five minutes into a mission – " he pauses accidentally, and to Ben's surprise, looks directly at him. "To rescue his nephew, it was like, I knew him before. He just had a way with people, to talk to them. We actually had a conversation about…" he stops again, blushing. "Well, he told me to try and get my heart tested. And possibly something about a Vioday shot after my R & R weekend in Coruscant."

That makes everyone positively shiver in laughter. Even his mother burst out, "Oh, Kivi, I swear!" angry and bright from Kivi's explicit confession.

The funny guy actually continues. "Although, he might have been peeking in there a little too often. Poor guy must have been really lonely wherever he was. He looked pretty good though; nice grizzly silver hair, very – "

They're all wheezing at this point, even Finn.

"Stop, Ki, you're giving us really bad images!" Someone begs him.

"Too late," Ben added in an extremely flat, unfortunate tone. He is mildly pleased to see some of the crew look at him and laugh harder.

It's so dumb that Ben is tempted to roll his eyes at this joke of a memorial service and walk away. It really is pitiful, surrounding a puny fire that could barely cook a single fish. And yet he's biting his tongue to keep from chuckling. For fuck's sake, this is his Luke Skywalker's funeral service. There should be a procession with flowers and horns or something.

Finally there's his mother's voice again, patient again. "Rey, is there anything you want to say?"

Ben looks up to see the woman wipe her eyes and survey the others in hesitation. A shy one as always, unaware of the gifts she possesses.

Against her will, her eyes gradually find their way up to Ben's. They immediately flick down to the ground near him, but nevertheless they linger.

He doesn't have to use the Force to know her thoughts. She feels guilty (when has guilt ever done anything good?!) being asked to speak about their shared mentor, when Ben himself is flesh and blood. She is guilty for being the preferred one, and he forever the damned one.

Ben will not speak up. He expects no one wants to make the awkward invitation to be kind to him. If they ever get off this damned rock to join the war again –

There's something in the sky.

No. Many things. Mechanics whir and calculate, carrying combustible energy.

Imperial probe droids. They've been found, finally.

"HIDE!" he shouts.


	31. Chapter 31

I need a Teacher

Chapter 31

Ben's shout makes all of them jump, considering he had been still as a rock during the whole ceremony.

As the tallest man among them, he erupts into movement. Rey is a mere second slower, finally sensing the oncoming sound from the sky. Less than a half-dozen black dots have entered the atmosphere.

They may as well have been TIE fighters. Those balls of mechanics and electricity can sense heat signatures and ground movement. Literally every single member of their group is on the hillside, and to top it all off they've lit a fucking fire.

Chewie and Leia have already put out the fire with a bucket of sand.

"There's no place to take cover," a woman muttered worriedly.

Rey is seized at the wrist. "Jump in the water – the drop in body temperature will help," Ben explains hurriedly.

Finn grabs the other woman. His form is whipped out of Rey's sight as her black-clad adversary pulls her through the suddenly open air.

 _They'll be all right_ , Ben near-whispers his thought against her through the Force, a seemingly reassuring act to calm as he shoves them both over the cliff.

 _Shit, shit, shit, shit shit!_ Rey thinks in a prayer. She pries for her training as they both dive like daggers into the sea. _Calm. Focus. Hold your breath._

The impact is less of a shock, like bouncing into a bed with covers. Where they've jumped, there's no beach – only a sheer black wall of wet rock, and a thin mouth of a cavern.

Under the water, Ben's Force-signature is too gentle, trying too hard to stay formal, suggesting they go there. There is a vibration like a lasso forming from where they just jumped. He's luring the probe droids, she realizes.

They swim without surfacing to the cave. Months ago Rey tinkered with one of these probe droids and noticed a major flaw, that they couldn't differentiate smaller, organic signatures from random animal life underwater.

Her lungs are itching for oxygen. She has just a little further to go, and even though it's dark she knows where Ben is.

His signal to emerge bobs gently at her. She peeks her head by a fraction. Pull in more oxygen. Find an exit. Her lightsaber won't be useful now that it's soaked.

She perks her ears upward, slowing her heartbeat and rushing blood to listen for the mechanical whirring.

The water lashes around her when Ben pulls her close. His eyes are hard and alert. "Deep breath," he tells her. He sinks under the surface and Rey follows.

She treads underneath for a few seconds until he reaches out for her again, urgent.

 _Stop doing that_ , she warns him with a jerk of her arm. His nails scrape against her as he practically manhandles her against a rock wall.

 _Be_ _still_ , he warns her icily. It's a testament of her nerves, holding her temper down as Ben looms over her as some kind of cover.

Agitated, Rey tries to calm herself. She'll lose her pocket of air. She's not sure how long she can hold her breath right now.

In the dull silence of the water, Ben reaches out to her with even more direct, mechanical gentleness. He brings her closer to him, clothes and hair brushing against her. One arm crosses over her back, doing some sort of tingling thing that makes her think he's joining her in meditation somehow. The other hand rests against the back of her head. Rey almost flinches. Her face is pressed gently along the crook of his shoulder, her temple at his chin. Even underwater she can feel the stubble growing there.

 _Be calm with me_ , he near-whispers through the Force. If Rey wasn't so concerned with hiding from the droids, she'd gasp. His power is stretched out, aching for hers.

He's asking to connect with her. If they join, who knows what'll happen. They probably don't have to do that, but those droids are so close.

Rey relents, tentatively. Only because…he's trying to protect her. And she doesn't want to leave his hold on her, but that's for a later time to think about.

Her thoughts seize when white light blinds her, reflecting off the black water.

She trusts his power so much because she knows he will not let her die, ever.

Above them, the probe droid hovers. Two souls bind together and dissipate into the current, murky and expanding while their bodies become still as the stone near them.

Not even a whimper dares leave Rey's mouth, for inside her head – it's like a newborn star. It's like the Force when it first came to her, incredible and unyielding. The sensation is not a little unlike their memory exercises, fluidly switching from picture to emotion. There's so much – so much of this person, of Ben, of Kylo Ren, of this scion of criminals and royalty, a frequently-tapped cavern of unfiltered emotions and pains and desires –

The wall, wherever it came from, descends like jaws to heavily tamper down the connection to the lowest of hums. Too much exposure. The thin connection maintains a level of assurance that, in each other's heads, they are safe. She, most of all, is safe.

What was that? Was that some kind of a connection? If it is, it is far greater than whatever she was allowed to share with Luke when he trained her. It tingles like alcohol and too much caf in her head and her chest. It's…she realizes it's so much like when she healed him last night. Only this time he's allowed the connection.

Rey isn't sure how much time has passed, but in the depths of the cave, ensnared by those great arms, she doesn't mind the man's…closeness. She waits. Against her better judgment, Force forbid he can sense it…she remembers. His chin resting on her head, her nose pressed against the thin wool of his shirt. The skin underneath. The warmth in her stomach and chest.

Sssssssssssssssssssssssssss

Eventually the whirring of the droid – of all the droids, is gone. Crisis averted.

The statue shifts back into a man again, and Ben Solo draws back. He nudges Rey out of their meditation and points upward.

When they break for air, Rey is surprised to see Ben turn away and tread towards the mouth of the cave. Does his skin tingle as much as hers, or is he just ignoring it?

He probably is. Wordlessly, Rey accepts that this – whatever it was – will become another Thing to Forget.

Another part of her – an immature, annoying part that has been planted from the company of her friends in the Resistance and matured beyond her expectation – wants to tease him. _Ooh, touch me again, Master Solo._ He'd blush and expectedly not speak to her for about an hour until he has to. At this point, Rey knows she has nothing to apologize for, or ignore.


	32. Chapter 32

I need a teacher 32

"The droid trashed all our equipment," one of the mechanics with goggles, Elveric, reports mournfully. He tosses aside a wired control panel with a grimace.

Leia upends their main communication tower, which had been dragged out of sight by their one Astromech droid, Ardee. The droid had shut down and accelerated everything in sight to full, cold hibernation mode. While their stuff has been rendered useless, at least the Imperial-class probe droids hadn't set fire on anything; which could mean either they hadn't seen anything suspicious, or they had and were reporting what they found to First Order analysts.

Right now, Leia is inclined to think the latter. If their band remains on this planet any longer, they could be waiting for the First Order to ambush them.

"All right, look, pack everything up and have all the radios on silent. We're leaving."

Half of the crew looks relieved. Elveric pops off his cartoonish goggles with a snap and glares at the general.

"What? Where are we supposed to go?"

Leia glares at the little smartass. "That's what you're gonna tell us. We'll hop between a couple of locations just to be safe. The nearest spaceport will do until we can trade our fighters for merchant-class ships. Ben, Rey – "

Nearby, the two soaked Jedi try not to look at each other.

"You two need to figure out if we'll encounter anyone out in the atmo before we launch into hyperspace."

"Can't we try and get into hyperspace before reaching atmo?" Finn asks. Without hesitating he adds, "Han and Chewbacca have done it with the _Falcon_."

"Might not be a good idea," Kivi points out, all business. "I wanna prep the engines – they've been cold for a week. Don't know what the damp around here's done to the engines."

Leia interrupts. "Not until I know we're not flying into a trap. Rey, Ben, we're not leaving until we know the coast is clear for us to relocate."

Rey is the first to get up and head outside the castle. Ben follows her, even though she doesn't look behind for him.

Even though the rest of the crew is scurrying up ramps and packing, it's as if the world contains only the two of them. Rey focuses on the ocean and the sun that decided to come out. Ben comes right next to her. His hair is half-dried from the wind already. She's heard the word fluffy before, applied to soft things like feathers and little animals, and thinks she wants to touch his hair again.

The man in question faces the coast with disdain. "I'm…sorry for…"

"Yeah, not – now's not – it's not a big deal." Rey deflates at how lame she sounds. "Let's just – "

Ben doesn't speak, only sighs in bitter reluctance. They both settle and search outward for activity among the stars.

ssssssssssssssssssssss

Apparently, the coast is _not_ clear. There is a Star Destroyer hovering right above their location, which is pretty stupid on their end. Still, it will make evacuation a little tricky.

Kivi is adamant in needing the crafts to prep before hyperspace. Leia recommends entering hyperspace on the other side of the planet where the Star Destroyer will be blocked on their location.

She turns to Ben and Rey. "I have an idea, but I don't think you've done this before."

Ben is surprised at his mother's plain admittance. He blinks. "That depends. What are you suggesting?"

"We need to get the aircrafts on the other side of the planet, but the engines need prep time."

Kivi interrupts. "Eight minutes is ideal."

"We've got time for two," Leia tells him. "How long can you two hold up our four fighters and the freighter?"

It takes several long seconds for anyone to comprehend what General Leia is asking. The phrase "hold up" is translated, for the most part, as the Jedi levitating the several thousand-ton objects in the air. Only when Leia's plan for escape shapes the image into their aircraft moving across the planet's surface at impossible speeds does everyone gape in disbelief.

Rey's eyes bulge. "That's – " she stammers. "I don't – "

"That may be possible, but the distance you are asking includes thousands of kilometers," Ben argues. He's summoned a bit of the old Kylo Ren to combat this woman's illogical plan. "The two of us cannot levitate five ships at the speed and distance you are counting on."

Leia hesitates. "Three of us."

No one expected it. From the back someone says, "W-what."

"You?" Kivi said.

Leia scowls. "Luke was my brother. What. Did you think the Force stuck to _one_ twin?"

Another nameless mechanic mutters, wide-eyed. "Dude. I'd heard rumors…"

Ben is firmly planted in the practical and glowers at his small mother. "You've never used the Force, not for anything."

"I have, too. I've used the Force plenty of times. I don't need to – Listen," Leia's voice is sharp as she interrupts herself. "I've trained before. I can help us lift the crafts along the coast. It extends west for another three thousand kilometers."

Rey begins muttering to herself at the incredible number. With the equipment useless, Leia takes out a spare pipe and draws a circle in the dirt. She drags the pipe into an arrow that curves halfway through like an equator, and then an "X" outside of the planet drawing.

"This is the Star Destroyer above us," she explains. "If we can take off into space from the other side of the planet – and while we're in the air, we'll start the engines just before we get into positions – we'll have a head start to disappear into hyperspace."

Barring the super-ridiculous amount of sheer magic it'll take for two and a half Jedi to levitate five ships at a hundred kilometers a minute…it's a decent plan, considering they are so greatly outnumbered by a damn Destroyer, which is probably waiting for them to so much as start their engines.

Rey looks around at some of the crew. Finn looks questionably at Rey.

"I – " she hates her hesitation. She scratches her head. "I don't think I can hold up a fighter, or a freighter – "

"You've taken down a TIE fighter in mid-flight," Ben reminds her flatly.

Rey blinks, not expecting him to switch gears and support this stupid idea. "Yeah, but I haven't – you know, flown one just with the _Force_ ,"

"You can do it," Finn says with sudden optimism.

Rey's eyebrows shoot up. "Excuse me?"

"You can," he says, shrugging. "Come on, girl, I've seen you do some crazy stuff. Remember that assassin missile you stopped right in front of the hideout on Malastere? It fizzled like a Risha bomb. It's madam here I'm worried about." He jerks his head sarcastically at Leia.

Cool brown eyes practically drill through Finn. "Please," Leia says under her breath. She steps outside and holds out her hand.

It's the trademark "I'm about to do something badass" gesture and everyone damn near skips outside to see what she'll do.

It takes a while. The nearest fighter mostly whines in protest. Chewie, who's nearby, flinches and covers his head while, finally, miraculously, the fighter teeters unsteadily a few inches…then a few feet from the ground.

From the other end, Leia breaks into a sweat. Her forehead is suddenly shiny but she doesn't bend from the pressure. Everyone marvels at how their leader hasn't collapsed yet. Do Jedi feel like they are actually lifting this stuff from the ground, or is it just like having a headache?

Ben and Rey know differently. They watch the older woman with disguised concern. Rey may love the woman a thousand times more than ever, but Ben struggles from asking Leia to stop.

She's always been stubborn. He knows it's a trait from his grandmother, his real grandmother, but it's also something that could only be combated by his father's careless, equally bossy streak.

When she makes the fighter spin like a toy, Ben has seen enough. He steps around the dumbfounded admirers and puts a hand on her. Actually touches her. He has to think for a moment, and put away the needy question, when was the last time she held him, grabbed his jawline so he could stoop over and endure a forceful kiss on the cheek from her?

 _Mom_. "Stop. Put it down."

Leia takes a deep breath. His incredulity, though stunted, is laced with solid pride. This is his Skywalker side in his mother. If Grandfather were alive…

The fighter is gracefully placed back down.

The hand that commanded the thing does not shake from the strain. Leia reaches over with her other hand and pats Ben's reassuringly. "I'm all right. I've done it plenty of times. When I was tired of the furniture," she jokes. "Now, Rey – your turn."

Ssssssssssssssssssssssssss

They all practice for about two more minutes. Rey and Leia concentrate on running a fighter each in the air, keeping a tight proximity together as they "fly" in circles around their settlement. As the far more experienced in the Force, Ben thrusts his focus skyward, detecting if any single officer or technician is scanning their location. Literally any skip in a pulse over their existence.

He hasn't attempted something so drastic before. He's managed to maneuver his personal cruiser away from an incoming missile a year ago in space combat, but beyond that he trusts he will master this feat in the rush of the moment.

Moreover, he is aware of Rey's untapped reserve of power. Though unrefined, Ben is certain that Rey will be doing most of the work. Ben will be able to channel her use of the Force into a finer command. Just so that all the ships remain close together, like tractor beams, and not wildly thrown out of order.

They can't waste any time now, they've got to go. However….

"Ben," Leia shakes her arms at the practice. "You and Rey. You two can't come with us."

Neither of them bother asking why not. It's obvious more than before, that Ben's proximity to the Resistance's leader will be ripped apart by an awaiting jail cell, a court martial and an execution.

Rey wants to know why she's stuck with him. Why it's assumed she's stuck with him.

"What are we supposed to do?" she asks.

At Leia's expectant tilt of her head, Ben answers with a sullen tone. "Hide."

Shaking her head, Rey puts forth an argument. "But you can't just have us away from the Resistance. They need us. We're the only people who can stop Snoke – you can't – !"

"They will kill him," Leia's voice, calm and strong like thin steel, like Luke's, "the minute we reach the base. We can't let that happen. We've worked too hard."

At that moment, Ben watches like he is on the sidelines, as his mother puts forth her most reassuring motherly front at Rey, who is rigid. We, she said. About what? About him?

From behind him, Finn pulls on his shirt and gestures they walk away to talk. "Where are you guys gonna go?"

He doesn't have a clue. He doesn't have an idea where he, Ben Solo, can retreat to. What will they even do? Train some more, he supposes.

When he explains with fake confidence to Finn, he nods in understanding. "Listen, Rey will know of some places for help. She's got a knack for it. There's enough favors she can get returned from people, who owe her from help she's given."

This sort of explanation is familiar. Han Solo has garnered enough 'favors' that have been returned, as well. Too bad his own son cannot use those, considering he hasn't been in real contact with his father's acquaintances, or because he's killed him.

Biting his cheek, Ben sums up the man who used to be one of his faceless underlings. This face has grown strong with resilience and freedom. Two men who used to hide behind masks, now born again.

"I suppose you'll try to free the other Stormtroopers." When Finn nods, Ben mirrors his mother's sense of diplomacy and extends his hand. "Good luck, then."

Finn doesn't balk at the gesture, making Ben feel confident that he did it. "Take care of her, all right?"

Avoiding the need to turn to Rey, Ben projects even more confidence. "I will."

The way Finn tilts his head back suggests he knows something. "Yes, you will," he replies.


	33. Chapter 33

I need a Teacher

Chapter 33

As soon as everyone's strapped in, the three Force-Sensitives get to work. Leia, Chewie and Kivi are in the freighter. Finn and the others have manned the fighters. The last fighter, a double-pilot spacecraft, allows Ben and Rey to safely combine their use of the Force to project towards the others.

It's fortunate that they can share the cockpit space together; a small assurance in case one of them buckles from the strain of levitating six spacecrafts at a hundred kilometers a minute.

Behind him – the seats are back-to-back – Rey is uncomfortably quiet. Even her breathing is carefully drawn.

"Relax," he tells her.

She scoffs. " _Relax_ , he tells me." And here the young woman's composure slips away. "This is insane."

"You fed yourself to a sand shark yesterday," Ben reminded her. In the most "I'm the descendant of royalty" tone possible, he added. "Get a hold on yourself. We have three powerful Jedi – "

"Two and a half," she muttered.

"Fine, two Skywalkers, and one who has been _trained_ under two Skywalkers," Ben clips out. "You have the strength to do this. Both you and my mother. I can divide my concentration and guide you both in the control. When it happens," he concludes in a softer tone, back into teacher mode. "Let me in."

In his mind he senses her absorb his words before nodding. They both look outward to the salt-stained window of the freighter. His mother is there, matching his stoic gaze with her own.

 _Ready?_

 _Yes._

They first divide the ships: Ben must lift their spacecraft first. They would move each ship out into the shallows of the ocean…if they happened to drop, they wouldn't crash like they could on land, and could possibly be retrievable through Force levitation.

If one of them lost concentration.

With one cleansing breath, Ben pulls the Force into him like the drawback before a tidal wave. It's so strong that, behind him, Rey gasps. He shuts her out, just a little; he needs to do this without her overwhelming presence in the small space.

When he's ready, his and Rey's spacecraft first hovers nervously over the ground. Unconsciously he reaches out to steady himself. Force, it looks far easier when his small mother did it! He's witnessed Snoke do feats like this before, when they didn't incorporate pain on someone, though his old master did them few and far between to add to his mystery.

Focus. Feel the air and the object sifting through it. This…this was his uncle's training. It is not enough to simply imagine lifting an object with imaginary hands, no matter if it was a pebble, a person or a speeder. Though that was the thing; Jedi rarely saw a necessity to "perform" tricks like this complicated levitation trick.

Metal creaks in protest. Ben's eyes ware open but he cannot see. His face is already red.

"You're doing it," Rey tells him, in reassurance instead of wonder.

 _Of course I am_ , a miniscule part reacts in irritation. It smooths over out of…not pride exactly, but a warm feeling nonetheless.

He knows, in a way because he feels he is the metal box he and Rey sit in, that he's finally pushed up one hundred meters from the rocks.

Sweat breaks through his face and pinpricks across his chest and shoulders. He has forgotten to breathe and now gasps.

"Your turn," he sputters to Rey.

The two of them blink in surprise when they sense a firm, willow-like presence around them. It's Leia checking on them. This is their communication until they've moved into a safer zone for the radio transmitters.

Both reassure her it's safe to proceed. Now Rey must get the rest of the small aircrafts. Ben's instructed (well, reminded) the two women that what the three need to do is connect each midair object like a woven cloth. They cannot just separately hold up any of the aircrafts. If one strains under the connection, the others can reorganize the weight of the Force.

Rey's got the fighter with Finn first. It lifts a little too quickly, jerking unevenly. Before Ben decides he should tell her to calm, Rey's already adjusted her focus and brings the fighter to the same level. They can't see it, but Finn's glowering nervously at them.

One down, several more to go. It would worry Uncle Luke how carelessly Rey brings all the fighters up in the air.

Now for the more intricate part: Ben and Rey must join in the Force and hold each fighter up together, before they and Leia can work on the larger freighter.

Ben's willingness is more direct, while Rey hesitates. It's his fault, he knows. He was too strong when they were underwater hiding from the probe droid. He should have been gentle, less prodding. He had assumed, after the memory exercises days ago, that since he's seen intimate parts of her past that he deserves to intrude in her head like that.

He's assumed too much, since that horrible moment when Rey was strapped in the interrogation chair, that Rey's sensitivity to the Force was something to…manipulate.

Guilt threatens to distract him. But then he feels her. She's coming forward to him, all warmth like an oncoming sunrise.

He's already so tired that he cannot help how his breath pours out in sweet relief. Though he prides himself in his control over the Force, graceful and commanding, this impossible stunt is costing him. He feels he will either go blind or permanently limp from the weight.

 _I've got you_ , says Rey - ? Or his mother. The weight lightens, and Ben feels like he can breathe again. It's as if the fighter/fighters were all resting on his arms, chest and head, and the ease of pressure does wonders already.

 _Gods and stars….._

"Easy – Easy! Hang on," Rey's Coruscanti accent barks.

The freighter's in the air. All of them are. Now…now the second tricky part. Moving.

"We need to go _slow_ ," Ben grits out.

Unbelievably, Rey snorts.

"We already are."

Blinking, Ben looks through the cockpit window. The coast they've all made their home has now transformed into unfamiliar ground. The castle is a dot erased by hills and cliffs.

They are moving at an alarming rate, like a speeder cruising along. The landscape passes them in placid quiet.

Ben searches, studying their signatures. His mother's presence in the Force is echoing in active waves, but it acts more like an anchor. The freighter she and Chewbacca sit in is in the middle of their formation, with Rey and Ben slightly off to the left.

 _Faster now_ , Leia commands.

There's a nudge somewhere from Rey, telling him _I'm game if you are._

Ben lets go by a hairline. He retightens his concentration on the half-dozen ships floating by their hands. There's a rush similar to the jump into hyperspace. The green, blue and gray become blurred brushstrokes as they all whiz past. The speed is almost a godsend because Ben doesn't have to concentrate on how fucking horribly difficult this is. He won't even really look outside, or close his eyes. He's so afraid that one indirect movement will short-circuit his control. The speed makes it bearable; it means they are closer to ending this practice and engaging the engines.

Then –

 _Engines in five seconds._

Leia's communicated this to everyone, including the pilots.

Four –

Behind Ben, Rey reaches out to the pilot's controls.

Three –

 _Bye, Finn. I'll miss you._

Ben doesn't want to hear it. He can't avoid it; they are connected. Does she _know_ he can hear her?

He can even feel Finn's damned unending reassurance: _No – it's 'see you soon,' okay Rey? You two will be fine._

The silvery connection from the freighter calls to Ben, too. _Ben. My son…be well. Be safe._

Two -

Here, Ben closes his eyes.

 _I'll be all right, Mom. I love you._

He doesn't know why…why he said that. So easily, like he has always been a golden child.

He'll blame it on the Force.

One –

Rey, however, will always mean it. She means it when he hears her say it to Finn.

It comes out in a worried tone _. I love you, okay Finn? I love_ -

Ben forgets it as soon as he feels the fuel sparking into action, a roar in his thrice-projected mind as the ship comes alive underneath. It shakes his concentration, but he recovers.

"Should we go higher?" Rey's tone is forcibly even.

"No, wait until everyone gets control of the engines," Ben responds. He projects the direction to everyone. The pilots – Kivi, Finn and the others – zero down in shaky excitement.

The radio transmitter crackles. "Funny guy to wizards one and two," says Kivi. "We're ready to take the reins."

"Go on – we'll catch you just in case," Rey tells them.

Like a defiant cruiser in a tractor beam, Ben feels the freighter pull away on its own. The three Force-sensitives sever the connection with ease. The freighter heads right toward the sun until it disappears. One by one, the fighters break off, humming in power.

Ben and Rey's ship linger behind, watching in case any of their comrades falter. They all fly skyward, the endless field of blue darkening to black.

"Entering hyperspace in three – " Kivi's voice rumbles through the radio. "Two – "

" – Take care of each other!" Leia's voice suddenly breaks through. Ben shakes his head at the intrusion. Her presence in the Force is overwhelming, a small sun in his head. "I'll see you both soon – "

The dot of the freighter disappears into the stars. In the cockpit, their breaths are as loud as waterfalls.

Each of the pilots except Finn sign off before disappearing as well. Finn's fighter lingers for a bit. "And don't kill each other," he jokes. "Save that for that bastard Snoke."

In irritation at his mother's outrageously outward display of affection, Ben clenches and relaxes his jaw. He's so wiped from gliding all the ships that he cannot think of a reply.

In another blink the young man is gone.

Rey leans forward at the controls. "The Star Destroyer's just over the curve of the planet. Where do we go?"

Blinking heavily, Ben flicks his hair away from his sweaty face. "Anywhere. It doesn't matter." He's so tired that he might fall asleep in the cockpit right now.

"You all right?"

Her voice is so kind and genuine that he forgets, just last night, that he had cast her away, had driven her into an emotional frenzy. He forgets how, before that, he saw a vision of them in a lustful embrace, lips pressed against hers…and was so taken aback he was almost horrified.

He's been doing this all wrong. What is he even fighting against? Is it so wrong…to have her? To be attached to her?

A week ago he gave up everything he had worked for, for the past 15 years of his life, a river of sweat and blood for a cause that lies over the horizon of the planet he had hid in.

It was hopeless. All hopeless. Ever since he had stumbled with such ridiculous, predatory confidence upon her.

And now he sits in a cramped space near her. His fate entirely rests in her hands, and not just because she's piloting.

He's not stupid. He realizes now that he could have done this all on his own. He didn't need to be rescued by Uncle Luke to come back into the Light.

But he did. He was not a stronger man.

"I'll be fine," he says with gentler authority. "Take us anywhere. I leave it entirely up to you."

He doesn't want to think anymore. He just wants to watch them escape to Force knows where and listen to her click away at the controls.

The secret planet disappears away into hyperspace.

Sssssssssssssssssssssssssssss

EPILOGUE

"Did anyone say what the planet's name was?"

Ben frowns. "No…I don't think it matters now."

"It's just…we said goodbye to Luke there," Rey says sadly. "It's…I wish we could have buried him there. He would have liked it. Instead of…" an angry red-black cavern disposed of by a worm of an enemy.

"He's dead." She grew up on a desolate planet. Shouldn't she understand how unimportant a dead body is, that it has no economic worth?

"I know, but…that was before. Now, it's like…like…I don't know."

She sounds so small and confused. Ben forgets he is nine years older than her, and behind him her sudden vulnerability makes him feel so much older. He is not sure he can offer her an answer, but he tries.

"He is one with the Force. All Jedi know that in death, they truly relinquish their material worth. His spirit will live on."

 _You_ _should know. You've killed dozens. Hundreds of Jedi are dead because of you._

The voice in his head is not Kylo Ren's or Snoke's. It's his own.

He feeds on Rey's fidgeting, craving distraction, and calls to her. "What."

"What?" she asks.

"What do you want to _say_?" he demands. "It's just us. You don't have that boy with you now." He's smug with his newfound attitude.

"Oh, well now I feel comfortable with you," she says snidely. "And he's not a boy any more than you are."

He's grateful they're not facing each other. Except that he wishes she could see him glower.

"Then don't talk to me if you don't want. I was simply providing you with an outlet."

It was as if he said I'm sorry. After less than ten seconds, Rey takes a deep breath.

"I think…" she struggles to elaborate. "I think, everything has opened up to me. Everything suddenly means something important. Everything. Like I've seen color and heard music for the first time. There's so much beauty and freedom and goodness, and we're fighting a war at the same time. It's bizarre – any day can be my last, and it's more precious to me than on Jakku where it didn't matter what was ahead, it would just be one miserable barren day after another. And…there's hope dancing around me, and because of that, there's the fear I will lose it. Everything is worth fighting for, and I feel…I feel like I'm bleeding out, and I can't stop it because it's so much."

Rey makes looking so vulnerable so easy, Ben thinks. He'd have rather singed himself with his lightsaber than admit weakness. A trait that isn't so much blamed from the Dark Side as it is from his own genetics.

Has she admitted this to Finn, or anyone else? He supposes Finn's isolation from a real human condition makes him a safe person to equally confide in.

Rey must have learned, by force, pain, discovery and loss, what it also means to be human. To have a family, to feel and to love. He knows his mother was one of the first to show her these things in a kinder setting. Is Ben meant to be a possible teacher in these things as well?

He is as unsure about this as their next destination.

So he decides to tell her about what he knows, what he's seen. He tells her about the first funeral he went to, a pilot from the Rebel Alliance who was a close friend of his parents. He tells her about some of the state celebrations, parades, and honorary funeral processions that happened when the Empire collapsed and watching old footage of them on the Holonet.

"When this war's over," he suggests, feeling foolish with this unnatural sense of optimism. "Perhaps we will come back to that planet. It gave us some small peace. It can do so for others. I will not be surprised that my uncle's so-called resting place will become a holy site for pilgrims."

Luke would deserve such an honor.

"But we don't even know what the planet's called."

Ben stretches his legs as best he can. He feels like he's babysitting an inquisitive child but clamps down his groan. "Then name it yourself."

The suggestion probably sounded like a tease to her, since she's silent for a while. Ben is surprised to hear her again.

"Sher-hatha."

The language is one of many he's heard her speak, in random pockets of time. He probably butchers the guttural-sounding name.

"I hope it means something."

There's an unattractive sound. She's snorting in laughter that cannot be held back. Ben finds that it makes him smile, so much that he covers his mouth with unnecessary discretion.

"Arse. It's Huttese," she explains. "It means sanctuary."

Sanctuary. How fitting. How true. In all his time imagining his return to the Light (which he had, against his nature) he hadn't thought it would be in a calming retreat of a location that allowed him such free roam. He imagined it would go horribly wrong, and Rey's presence from the Resistance would be an unbearable experience. So much that he would recoil even more from the Light.

Now it doesn't burn him. He has come out, tentatively, into its embrace. Though he believes he does not deserve it still.

And yet…and yet, for the first time, against all the odds, against the phantom pain in his side, and the old cries of the dying in his head…he's found someone who willingly ties herself to him. Who isn't afraid of sharing her fate with him.

For the first time, Ben Solo _hopes_.


	34. Chapter 34

Author's note:

Thanks for your support, guys.

This has been a very challenging relationship to build. Romances between two unlikely characters – good ones – are tricky. It has to be more than 'oh, they're in a room, sudden lustful feeling emerge from fucking nowhere,' and they're ready to make out.

I was hoping to get to some of the….joyful parts that we all crave to see, trust me. However, as soon as I started developing more time to this piece, I saw that it could become more. Like, trilogy more.

I don't think I'll change the rating, but I've already started on the sequel – The Call to the Light. Rey and Ben have a lot to do while the others rejoin the Resistance. There will be new characters, the return of the Falcon, old memories of Rey with Luke (and Kylo Ren)…and more exciting things that start with kissing. Close quarters aboard a ship, and all that.

Until then, thanks again for reading my new work. I'll try not to take too long

Slayer (as in "The")


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